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THE  CITIZEN'S  LIBRARY 

OF 

ECONOMICS,  POLITICS,  AND 
SOCIOLOGY 

EDITED  BY 
RICHARD  T.  ELY,  Ph.D.,  LL.D. 

PROFESSOR  OF   POLITICAL  ECONOMY, 
UNIVERSITY  OF  WISCONSIN 


EDUCATION  AND  INDUSTRIAL 
EVOLUTION 


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MONOPOLIES  AND  TRUSTS.    By  Richard  T.  Ely.  Ph.D.,  LL.D. 

THE  ECONOWIICS  OF  DISTRIBUTION.    By  John  A.  Hobson. 

WORLD  POLITICS.     By  Paul  S.  Reinsch.  Ph.D..  LL.B. 

ECONOMIC  CRISES.    By  Edward  D.  Jones.  Ph.D. 

OUTLINE  OF  ECONOMICS.    By  Richard  T.  Ely.  Ph.D..  LL.D. 

GOVERNMENT  IN  SWITZERLAND.    By  John  Martin  Vincent,  Ph.D. 

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STUDIES    IN  THE  EVOLUTION  OF  INDUSTRIAL  SOCIETY.    By  Richard  T. 

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LABOR  MOVEMENT  IN  AMERICA.    By  Richard  T.  Ely.  Ph.D.,  LL.D. 
NEWER  IDEALS  OF  PEACE.     By  Jane  Addams. 
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Education  and 
Industrial  Evolution 


BY 
FRANK  TRACY  CARLTON,  Ph.D. 

Phofessor  of  Economics  and  History 
IN  Albion  College 


I13eto  gotfe 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 
1913 

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Co  tfje  Qiemorp 

OF    MY     MOTHER 
AND  TO  MY  WIFE 


PREFACE 

The  labor  problem  has  always  been  one  of  the 
chief  causes  of  economic  thought  and  research.  In 
recent  decades  this  problem  has  held  a  predominant 
place  in  the  minds  of  students  of  economic  ques- 
tions. Economists,  when  considering  this  complex 
problem,  have  often  overlooked  one  very  important 
factor, — education.  John  Stuart  Mill  stands  pre- 
eminent among  economists  in  recognizing  the  true 
value  of  education  in  the  betterment  of  the  masses 
and  in  the  solution  of  the  labor  problem.  The 
pages  of  this  volume  are  devoted  to  a  consideration 
of  the  educational  problems  which  are  vitally  and 
indivisibly  connected  with  the  social  and  industrial 
betterment  of  the  people  of  the  United  States.  The 
author  hopes  that  it  may  lead  to  a  more  general 
recognition  of  the  truth  that  modifications  in  edu- 
cation are  demanded  on  account  of  industrial  and 
social  evolution,  and  with  this  they  should  keep 
pace. 

Portions  of  several  chapters  have  already  ap- 
peared as  articles  contributed  to  The  Engineering 
Magazine,  The  Popular  Science  Monthly,  The  Jour- 
nal of  Pedagogy,  and  Education.  For  many  facts 
and  statistics  the  author  is  indebted  to  official  pub- 
lications of  the  United  States  government. 

FTC 

Albion,  Michigan. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER    I 

Introduction     ......  .       . 

Increased  pioduction  during  the  nineteenth 
century  made  possible  modern  democracy  and  uni- 
versal education. — Modern  economic  and  educa- 
tional thought  have  developed  along  parallel  lines. 
— Early  education  laid  stress  upon  those  elements 
which  were  not  important  to  the  masses. — Mod- 
ern education  should  benefit  all  classes, — should 
be  democratic. — The  relation  between  education 
and  industry. — The  significance  of  educational 
"fads." — The  true  value  of  classical  and  purely 
cultural  studies. — The  problem  of  the  twentieth 
century  is  to  make  education  an  engine  for  social 
betterment. 

PART  I 

The  Modern  Educational  Problem 

CHAPTER   II 

Educational  Epochs  in  the  United  States 

Educational  progress  is  secondary  to  industrial 
and  social  advance,  and  lags  somewhat  behind  the 
latter. — First  period  in  the  educational  history  of 
America. — Second  period. — Third  period. — Fourth 
period. — How  the  new  science  of  education  may 
become  truly  scientific. 

ix 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER    III 

Twy   Relation  between   Educational  Advance  and 
Industrial   Progress 45 

Criticism  of  the  "great  man"  theory  of  edu- 
cation.— Education  is  the  combined  work  of  many 
different  institutions. — The  paradox  of  modern 
wdustrial  life. — The  school  must  furnish  a  clew  to 
the  intricate  industrial  labyrinth. — The  order  fol- 
lowed in  the  enrichment  of  the  curriculum. — 
The  influence  of  the  frontier. — The  effect  of  its 
disappearance. — The  importance  of  characteristic 
traits  of  immigrants. — The  modern  city  is  a  mere 
industrial  establishment. — The  city  and  educational 
programs. — Division  of  workers  into  distinct 
classes. — The  growing  rigidity  of  class  demarka- 
tion. — The  effect  of  consolidation  of  industry  and 
the  "machine  process." — The  problem  of  leisure. — 
The  economic  limit  of  subdivision  of  labor. — 
The  persistence  of  inherited  traits. — Imperialism 
and  education. 

CHAPTER   IV 

New  Aims,  Ideals  and  Methods  in  Education       .      73 

The  conflict  between  old  and  new  educational 
ideals. — The  demand  for  uniformity  in  spite  of 
individual  variations. — The  coexistence  of  many 
types  in  the  moral,  physical  and  intellectual 
world. — The  directive  function  of  the  school. — 
Value  of  personal  experience  in  the  educative 
process. — The  lesson  taught  by  sociology. — The 
proper  sphere  of  the  text-book. — The  prejudice 
against  manual  labor. — Educational  ideals  of  to-day 
do  not  tend  to  soften  this  prejudice. — Undue 
emphasis  is  laid  upon  personal  success. — ^Useful 
work  is  the  true  aim  of  human  activities. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER   V 

Woman  and  Industry q^ 

The  problem  is  complicated  by  deep-seated 
prejudices. — Modifications  in  the  industrial  func- 
tions of  the  home. — The  old  ideal  of  home  life  is 
not  adapted  to  the  present. — The  multiplication  of 
women  wage-earners. — Woman  is  at  the  parting 
of  the  ways.- — The  economic  effect  of  the  entrance 
oi  women  into  industry. — Its  effect  upon  the  race. 

CHAPTER   VI 

Education  of  Women 109 

Division  of  educational  functions  between  the 
home  and  the  school. — The  increasing  importance 
of  the  school. — The  home  is  not  always  the  best 
place  for  children. — The  parental  school  teaches 
certain  valuable  lessons  to  educators. — The  home 
will  continue  to  be  the  most  fundamental  of 
American  institutions. — The  education  of  women 
presents  a  double  task. — The  importance  of  wo- 
man's position  in  charge  of  the  home. — The  con- 
ception of  wide  differences  in  the  abilities  of  the 
two  sexes  is  being  removed. — Conclusion. 

CHAPTER  VII 

The  Industrial  and  Educational  Value  of  Manual 
Training   and   Laboratory   Work        .        .        .     127 

The  significance  of  the  introduction  of  manual 
training  and  laboratory  work  into  the  curriculum. 
— The  distinction  between  trade,  manual-training 
and  technical  schools. — Functions  of  each. — The 
training  of  the  technical  and  the  shop  man. — The 
manual-training  school  should  relieve  the  technical 
school  of  preparatory  work. — The  necessity  of 
training  for  American  workmen. — Manual  training 
and  labor  unions. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER   VIII 

,Jhe  Educational  and  Industrial  Significance  of 

THE  Arts  and  Crafts  Movement         .        .       .    140 

The  arts  and  crafts  movement  is  a  part  of  the 
democratic  movement  in  education. — The  relation 
between  art  and  industry. — Art  in  the  crafts 
emphasizes  services. — Indications  of  a  revival  of 
skilled  hand  work. — Arts  and  crafts  societies. — 
Civic  improvement. 

CHAPTER   IX 

•■Organized  Labor  and  Educational  Progress  .  .  150 
Industrial  freedom  and  equality  is  a  dominant 
issue  of  to-day. — The  ethics  of  organized  labor. — 
The  significance  of  the  labor  movement. — The 
ideals  of  organized  labor. — Labor  unions  and  child 
labor. — The  significance  of  the  opposition  to  child- 
labor  legislation. — Progress  toward  race  soli- 
darity.— Unions  are  entering  upon  a  period  of 
constructive  work. — Past  services  of  organized 
labor  to  the  cause  of  education. — Educational 
demands  of  organized  labor. 

PART  II 

Actual  or  Proposed  Additions  to  the  Educa- 
tional System 

CHAPTER  X 

Industrial  and  Trade  Education  ....  169 
The  kindergarten  movement. — Manual  train- 
ing.— Domestic  science  or  household  economics. — 
The  trade  school. — Self-supporting  or  half-time 
schools. — Correspondence  instruction. — The  negro 
industrial  school. — Apprenticeship  in  the  United 
States. 

xii 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER    XI 

Technical,    Agricultural    and    Commercial    Edu- 
cation          204 

Technical  education. — Agricultural  education. — 
(a)  The  agricultural  college. —  (b)  Agriculture  in 
the  public  schools. —  (c)  The  farmers'  institute. — 
(d)  The  United  States  Department  of  Agricul- 
ture.— Schools  of  forestry. — Commercial  education. 

CHAPTER   Xn 

The  Continuation  School 226 

Needed  to  provide  educational  opportunities  for 
young  workers. — Objections  to  the  establishment 
of  continuation  schools. — Curriculum. — Need  of  an 
object  lesson. 

CHAPTER   Xni 

The  Treatment  of  the  Truant  and  the  Juvenile 

Delinquent 239 

A  city  problem, — A  pen  picture  of  the  juvenile 
delinquent. — Conditions  which  produce  the  juvenile 
delinquent. — Children  are  never  wholly  bad. — The 
school  should  be  directive. — Classes  of  schools  for 
truants  and  juvenile  delinquents. — The  Chicago 
Parental  School. — Treatment  of  juvenile  crimi- 
nals.— The  cumulative  evils  of  poverty. 

CHAPTER   XIV 

New   Educational  Projects 254 

The  school  as  a  social  center  and  a  playground. — 

The    utilization    of    the    summer    vacation. — The 

school     city. — School     savings     banks. — University 

extension  and  traveling  libraries. — Transportation 

xiii 


CONTENTS 

of  children  to  and  from  school. — Medical  inspection 
in  the  schools. — The  school  nursery. — Feeding 
school  children. — The  school  as  an  employment 
agency. — Paying  children  to  go  to  school. — What 
is  the  meaning  of  these  innovations? — Industrial 
evolution  is  the  only  solid  basis  for  educational 
radicalism. 

CHAPTER   XV 

The  School  of  the  Future 302 

Only  the  broad  outlines  of  the  educational  pro- 
gram of  the  future  can  be  discerned. — The  fluidity 
of  future  educational  requirements. — In  the  future, 
students  will  be  freed  from  rigid  routine. — Example 
and  environment,  rather  than  precepts,  will  be 
emphasized. — The  work  of  the  school  of  the  future 
will  not  be  repulsive  to  the  child. — The  menace  of 
"commercialization." — Organization  of  the  teach- 
ers.— The  need  of  well  trained  teachers. — The 
financial  problem. — "Race  suicide"  and  educational 
problems. 


EDUCATION  AND 
INDUSTRIAL  EVOLUTION 


CHAPTER  I 
INTRODUCTION 

During  the  last  century  the  productive  powers  of 
man  were  repeatedly  multiplied  by  means  of  the 
utilization  of  the  energy  of  coal  and  water  through 
the  agency  of  steam  and  electricity.  President 
James  has  illustrated  this  fact  very  vividly.  "It  is 
not  too  much  to  say  that  the  population  of  the  single 
State  of  Germany,  with  an  area  not  exceeding  that 
of  Texas,  is  equal  to-day  in  working  force  to  the 
combined  efforts  of  the  population  of  the  whole 
world  at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century. 
The  United  States  has  to-day  within  its  borders  an 
effective  power  in  the  engines  at  work,  far  surpass- 
ing the  total  possible  power  of  the  entire  population 
of  the  world  a  century  ago.  In  many  lines  of  work 
one  man,  with  the  aid  of  a  small  machine,  may  do 
as  much  work  as  fifty  or  a  hundred  men  could  have 
done  at  the  beginning  of  the  century ;  while  in  other 
departments,  owing  to  the  development  of  the  ap- 
plication of  steam  and  electricity,  one  man  may  do 
what  all  the  population  of  the  world  combined  could 
not  have  accomplished  a  hundred  years  ago."  As  the 
direct  result  of  this  marvelous  and  unprecedented 
increase  in  the  world's  productive  capabilities,  the 
human   race  as   a  whole  has   been  lifted  from  a 

3 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

condition  of  constant  and  strenuous  struggle  for  the 
bare  necessities  of  life  to  a  higher  plane  of  material 
comfort.  With  the  increase  of  material  wealth  has 
been  ushered  in  the  new  spirit  of  democracy,  a  spirit 
which  could  not  come  into  being  until  science  and 
invention  had  cleared  the  way.  The  worker  is  now 
considered,  theoretically  at  least,  to  be  an  end  in 
himself.  He  is  no  longer  conceived  to  exist  merely 
for  the  benefit  and  profit  of  others.  In  an  age  of 
machinery  and  utilized  natural  power,  at  the  end  of 
a  period  of  extraordinary  advancement  in  material 
wealth  and  during  an  era  of  peace ;  leisure,  culture, 
education,  art  and  work  are  at  last  conceived  to  be 
the  birthright  of  all,  not  merely  of  a  favored  few. 
Universal  culture  and  education  have  heretofore 
been  impossible  because  of  the  meager  productivity 
of  unaided  man. 

During  the  nineteenth  century,  greater  changes 
in  manufacture,  commerce  and  agriculture  took 
place  than  during  the  preceding  ten  centuries.  The 
military  basis  of  civilization  was  hastily  swept  away, 
and  replaced  by  industrial  foundations.  New  classes 
of  people  and  new  economic  interests  arose,  and 
old  ones  disappeared  or  sank  in  relative  importance. 
Manners,  customs  and  ways  of  living  were  trans- 
formed. The  ends  of  the  earth  were  drawn  into 
vital  contact;  the  continents  were  moored  side  by 
side.  In  a  word,  social  and  industrial  life  was 
revolutionized.  The  qualities  which  count  for  na- 
tional success  and  grandeur  are  no  longer  purely 
warlike  or  artistic ;  industrial  capacity  and  skill  now 
become  absolutely   essential.    The  warrior  bows, 

4 


INTRODUCTION 

except  under  unusual  circumstances,  to  the  skilled 
mental  or  manual  worker;  the  engineer  with  his 
slide-rule  displaces  the  epauletted  soldier.  The 
strongest  nation  is  the  one  most  efficient  from  an 
industrial  and  commercial  point  of  view.  Indus- 
trial progress  and  educational  advance  began  to 
assume  important  proportions  early  in  the  nine- 
teenth century.  In  preceding  centuries  both  in- 
dustry and  education  were  overshadowed  by  other 
factors  which  were  characteristic  of  a  more  primi- 
tive and  disjoined  state  of  human  society.  In  early 
times  industry  was  in  a  large  measure  left  to  slaves 
and  serfs;  and  education  was  confined  to  a  narrow 
field  and  to  a  numerically  restricted  class  of  people. 
The  sixteenth,  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  cen- 
turies, however,  foreshadowed  coming  events.  The 
history  of  modern  education  can  be  properly  studied 
only  from  the  point  of  view  of  industrial  evolution. 
The  economist  and  the  educator  here  join  hands; 
but  unhappily  neither  has  been  able  to  grasp  the 
real  situation.  Democracy,  a  wage-earning  class  \ 
and  universal  education  are  the  social  institutions  I 
which  develop  side  by  side  out  of  the  same  soil, —  1 
one  strengthens  and  protects  the  others.  Early^ 
democracy  was  aristocratic;  early  education  was 
likewise  intended  for  the  elect.  The  progress  of 
democracy  has  been  to  admit  one  class  after  an- 
other into  the  charmed  circle  from  which  the  ancient 
lowly  were  sternly  excluded;  during  the  same  time 
education  has  been  broadening  its  scope  and  en- 
riching   its    content.     These    phenomena    are    not 

5 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

isolated  and  unrelated ;  they  are  intimately  and 
vitally  joined  to  each  other. 

Two  periods  of  scientific  economic  thought  may 
be  distinguished  in  the  United  States  during  the 
nineteenth  century.  The  early  period  opened 
approximately  with  the  educational  revival  of  the 
2o's;  and  the  second  was  formally  ushered  into 
existence  by  the  organization,  in  1885,  of  the 
American  Economic  Association.  A  new  birth  of 
economic  thought  seems  to  be  approaching;  econ- 
omists are  becoming  impatient  with  the  old 
formulae.  Theory  and  practice  are  drawing  closer 
together;  a  new  school  of  economists  might  almost 
j  be  said  to  be  in  the  process  of  formation.     The 

i  concepts  of  education  and  of  political  economy  held 

i  during  the  first  half  of  the  last  century  were  nar- 

j  row,    much    narrower   than   those    now    generally 

;  accepted.     The  earlier  political  economy,  as  a  rule, 

I  considered  man  to  be  an  animal  in  whom  all  other 

i  ambitions,  aims,  desires   and  loves  were  subordi- 

'  nated  to  the  desire  for  wealth  getting.     The  theory 

I  was    purely    a    mathematical    or    mechanical   one. 

I  Accept  the  premises  and  the  rest  followed  as  a 

j  logical  consequence;  but  the  premises  were  falla- 

I  cious.     The  political  economy  of  that  period  con- 

j  sidered    the    "fictitious"    economic    man;    modern 

j  economic  thought  studies  the  real  man,  the  man  of 

many  and  mixed  motives.    As  a  necessary  result 
j  of  the  expansion  in  the  scope  of  economic  science, 

the  relation  between  economics  and  the  science  of 
education  has  become  intimate  and  important. 
Economics  is  now  a  study  of  man  in  his  endeavor 

6 


INTRODUCTION 

to  obtain  the  necessities,  comforts  and  luxuries  of 
life.  Man,  not  wealth,  is  placed  in  the  foreground. 
"Economic  science  is  interested  in  the  many  complex 
problems  which  are  connected  with  the  production, 
distribution  and  consumption  of  economic  goodsi — 
goods  which  men  desire  and  which  require  effort 
to  obtain.  Production  and  distribution  are  only 
means  to  an  end,  which  end  is  the  third,  consump- 
tion of  the  material  and  immaterial  goods,  produced 
and  distributed  for  the  benefit  and  enjoyment  of 
mankind.  Judged  from  the  point  of  view  of  the 
economic  science  this  is,  indeed,  the  ultimate  end 
and  aim  of  all  human  activity.  In  so  far  as  edu- 
cation affects,  in  any  manner,  production,  distribu- 
tion or  consumption,  or  in  so  far  as  it  changes  or 
modifies  the  efficiency,  the  tastes  or  the  ideals  of 
men,  it  has  an  economic  and  a  social  significance. 
The  growth  of  democracy  and  the  increasing  par- 
ticipation of  the  masses  in  political  activity  and  in 
the  educational  heritage  of  the  age  are  accompanied 
by  the  dawn  of  new  economic  and  educational 
concepts. 

In  recent  decades  the  science  of  education,  like  // 
economic  science,  has  been  passing  through  im- 
portant and  fundamental  modifications.  The  em- 
phasis has  shifted  from  the  leisure  class  ideal  of 
education  for  culture  and  discipline  to  the  indus- 
trial, utilitarian  and  democratic  ideal  of  education 
as  a  means  of  improving  civic  and  industrial 
efficiency.  The  older  methods  and  concepts  of 
education  originated  at  a  time  when  the  older  view 
of  the  workingman  and  of  his  sphere  of  life  and 

7 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

activity  was  held.  Education,  except  perhaps  the 
three  R's,  was  not,  in  earlier  periods  of  our  history, 
intended  for  the  laboring  man ;  it  was  only  for  the 
"cultured"  classes.  Students  of  educational  prob- 
lems have  only  recently  begun  to  recognize  that 
society  is  no  longer  on  a  scholastic,  feudal  or  mili- 
tary basis.  Although  education  in  the  United 
States  is  free  and  compulsory,  its  growth  has  not 
been  accompanied  by  that  change  in  method  and 
scope  which  should  come  with  its  extension  to  all 
classes  in  a  democratic  community.  A  modern 
democracy  of  the  industrial  type  demands  both  an 
extension  of  educational  privileges,  and  a  departure 
from  the  traditional  methods  of  instruction  in  order 
to  fulfill  the  conditions  necessary  to  prolonging  its 
existence.  The  democratic  view  of  education  is 
just  beginning  to  rise  above  the  pedagogical  hori- 
zon. Free  compulsory  education  is  not  democratic, 
if  it  is  of  the  kind  and  character  which  is  valuable 
chiefly  to  the  professional  man,  or  to  the  man  of 
leisure;  nor  is  it  democratic  if  it  merely  aims  to 
increase  the  efficiency  and  speed  of  the  employees 
in  our  great  industrial  establishments.  Scientific 
engineering  and  financial  questions  have  occupied 
the  center  of  the  stage  during  the  last  three  or  four 
decades ;  the  endeavor  to  solve  these  problems  has 
finally  pushed  into  the  foreground  an  entirely  new 
and  unexpected  set  of  allied  problems  belonging  to 
the  field  of  social  science ;  and  is  forcing  them  upon 
a  reluctant  society.  Social,  economic  and  educa- 
tional questions  are  to  be  of  vital  interest  and  im- 
portance in   the   immediate   future.     The   political 

8 


INTRODUCTION 

need  of  universal  education  has  been  particularly 
emphasized  in  the  United  States ;  it  has  often  been 
thought  of  merely  as  a  training  for  citizenship  and 
for  casting  the  ballot  on  election  day.  To-day, 
while  not  minimizing  in  the  least  the  importance 
of  this  function,  a  far  wider  concept  is  beginning 
to  rise  above  the  educational  horizon,  heralding  the 
dawn  of  a  new  pedagogical  day.  The  economic 
and  social  functions  of  education  are  to  be  em- 
phasized during  this  new  era.  If  education  per- 
forms its  duty  in  this  respect,  good  citizenship  is 
the  natural  fruitage.  If  education  is  to  light  the 
path  over  which  the  car  of  progress  is  to  pass,  it 
must  not  only  open  its  arms  to  all,  but  it  must 
provide  nourishment  which  is  adapted  to  the  edu- 
cational requirements  of  all  classes  of  individuals. 
In  the  past  all  educational  innovations  have  laid 
stress  upon  those  elements  which  were  least  im- 
portant to  the  mass  of  the  people.  In  colonial 
New  England  compulsory  education  was  insisted 
upon  on  religious   grounds  in  order  to  benefit  a 

\puritanical  priesthood  or  ministerial  element. 
Great  stress  was  laid  upon  higher  education, — ^the 
classics,  theology,  literature.  The  motive  for  ele- 
mentary education  was  purely  religious.  When 
scientific  training  was  first  introduced,  special  em- 
phasis was  laid  upon  advanced  work  and  research 
rather  than  upon  the  more  elementary  work, — the 
dissemination  of  the  results  of  research  among  the 
mass    of    the    people.     Technical    education    and 

\manual  training  receive  better  financial  support  in 
^le  college  and  high  school  than  in  the  elementary 

9 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

school  where  the  value  of  these  branches  to  the 
mass  of  the  people  is  particularly  great.  Our 
university  and  college  professors  and  high  school 
teachers  are  better  paid  and  more  highly  honored 
than  the  grade  school  teacher.  Indeed  there  is  a 
gradation  of  salary  and  honor  from  university  pro- 
fessors to  the  primary  teacher;  yet,  pedagogically 
and  sociologically  considered,  the  latter  is  of 
greatest  importance.  Education  began  with  the 
abstract  and  the  far  away,  rather  than  as  common 
sense  and  pedagogical  science  teaches,  with  the 
concrete  and  the  near-at-hand.  This  fact  can  be 
explained  on  the  basis  of  conflict  of  economic  in- 
terests. Only  within  a  few  generations  has  the 
working  class  reached  a  position  in  the  community 
from  which  they  are  able  to  effectively  voice  their 
demands.  Higher  education  remains,  in  many 
cases,  still  merely  a  form  of  what  Veblen  calls  con- 
spicuous waste.  The  so-called  "finishing  school" 
may  be  classed  under  the  head  of  conspicuous 
waste.  The  sons  of  many  wealthy  men  do  not  go 
to  college  because  of  a  thirst  for  knowledge,  but 
because  it  will  give  them  social  prestige.  College 
life  is  conceived  to  be  a  form  of  club  life.  In  Bel- 
gium, Germany  and  France,  where  the  social  spirit 
is  better  developed,  where  the  frontier  influence  has 
not  been  felt  for  generations,  the  education  of  the 
masses, — useful  education  as  contrasted  with  orna- 
mental and  purely  disciplinary  education — has  ad- 
vanced further  than  in  the  United  States. 

The  educator,  like  the  politician,  has  in  the  past 
clung  to  the  theory  that  well-defined  class  demarka- 


INTRODUCTION 

tion  does  not  exist  in  America;  but  recent  in- 
novations in  education  disclose  an  unconscious 
modification.  It  must  soon  be  consciously  and  un- 
reservedly accepted  that  there  are  classes  and  con- 
flicting interests  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic;  and 
we  must  act  accordingly.  Leaders  in  education 
must  recognize  the  existence  of  great  social  and 
economic  inequalities,  and  must  strive  to  reduce  to  a 
minimum  the  differentiations  which  are  undesirable 
and  which  lead  toward  class  hatred  and  class 
exploitation.  History  in  modern  times  is  a-xecord 
of  the  struggle  of  the  workers  upward  toward 
equal  political,  educational  and  economic  privileges. 
The  great  movements  in  history  have  been  con- 
sciously or  unconsciously  dominated  by  the  strug- 
gle for  a  living,  for  economic  betterment.  The 
school,  the  college,  the  university  and  the  profes- 
sional schools  should  calmly  and  impartially  in- 
vestigate and  teach  the  facts  which  social  and 
industrial  evolution  present.  When  this  is  not  the 
case,  education  may  be,  and  frequently  is,  perverted 
from  its  true  mission ;  it  becomes  an  engine  which 
builds  up  and  strengthens  class  animosity  and  social 
rigidity.  Education  should  benefit  all  classes,  agri- 
cultural, commercial,  industrial  and  professional, 
and  the  subdivisions  within  each  of  these  classes. 
In  the  eye  of  the  educator  each  should  be  of  equal 
value.  The  school  has  hitherto  been  unduly  in- 
fluenced by  the  ideals,  and  has  taught  the  ethics, 
the  morals  and  principles  which  the  commercial 
and  propertied  classes  have  upheld.  It  has  entirely 
overlooked  the  fact  that  the  ethical  code  of  the 

II 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

industrial  worker  and  the  ethical  code  of  the  agri- 
culturist are  both  of  necessity  different  from  this 
and  from  each  other.  In  the  future,  if  education 
is  to  perform  its  proper  functions,  a  somewhat 
different  set  of  ideals  must  find  a  place  in  our 
scheme  of  education. 

Industry  and  education  in  early  days  went  hand 
m  hand.  "Under  Medievalism  the  guild  and  the 
university  were  not  far  apart."  Early  formal  edu- 
cation was,  however,  directed  chiefly  toward  letters 
and  literature.  The  present-day  separation  of  in- 
dustry and  education  is  a  result  of  the  carrying 
down  of  old  conceptions  into  modern  times.  When 
science,  industry,  commerce  and  agriculture  were 
first  recognized  as  proper  fields  for  school  work, 
it  was  natural,  perhaps  inevitable,  that  machinery 
and  methods  similar  to  those  which  had  been  ap- 
plied to  the  teaching  of  the  classics  and  mathematics 
should  still  be  used.  The  segregation  of  students, 
rigid  class  systems,  the  isolation  of  the  students 
from  the  practical  things  of  life,  and  the  cultivation 
of  the  scholastic  ideals,  are,  with  slight  modifica- 
tions, still  adhered  to.  But  a  reaction  is  at  hand. 
The  problem  is  to  develop  along  with  the  purely 
cultural  and  disciplinary  Vv^ork  of  education,  new 
functions  which  will  increase  the  industrial,  social 
and  civic  efficiency  of  young  men  and  young 
women  in  the  present  industrial  era.  Both  gov- 
ernment and  education  need  "democratising"  in  the 
best  sense  of  the  term.  Education  is  now  concerned 
with  much  more  than  the  teaching  of  reading, 
writing,    arithmetic,    geography,    political    history, 


INTRODUCTION 

languages,  literature,  and  the  like;  it  must  be  an 
integral  and  vital  part  of  the  experience  of  every 
future  efficient  member  of  the  community. 

The  recent  modifications  and  additions  to  the 
curriculum  are  indicative  of  unrest  or  of  dissatis- 
faction with  educational  results.  Our  educational 
machinery  has  proved  inadequate  because  it  was 
only  adapted  to  the  performance  of  certain  limited 
tasks.  Great  modifications  are  necessary  in  order 
to  construct  a  system  which  will  perform  the  varied 
and  complex  educational  work  which  should  be 
done  to-day.  New  and  fundamental  concepts  re- 
garding educational  principles  are  now  needed 
which  square  with  centralized  and  systematized 
industry,  subdivision  of  labor,  large  urban  popula- 
tions, increase  in  the  numbers  of  the  laboring 
population,  the  growth  of  organized  labor,  dis- 
similar populations,  enlarged  governmental  activi- 
ties, and  a  democratic  form  of  government.  When 
our  public-school  system  was  devised  only  one  of 
these  conditions,  the  latter  one,  was  in  existence. 
Just  as  our  representative  form  of  government  has 
broken  down  in  an  unanticipated  way,  so  has  our 
educational  system  failed  to  respond  fully  to  the 
last  call  of  the  nineteenth,  and  the  first  demands 
of  the  twentieth  century.  In  the  educational,  as 
in  the  political  world,  a  bitter  struggle  is  being 
carried  on  between  those  standing  for  the  old  and 
those  advocating  a  newer,  less  individualistic  con- 
ception and  philosophy;  and  the  latter  are  daily 
gaining  ground. 

13 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

Public  education  has  for  its  goal  the  welfare  of 
the  individual  in  society,  and  of  society  itself. 
Urban  populations  and  world  markets  have  taken 
away  much  of  the  old,  illusory  freedom  of  the 
individual;  he  can  at  present  do  little  for  himself. 
Organized  society  must  now  do  much  which  it 
formerly  omitted.  Cooperation  is  the  watchword 
of  to-day.  Society  must  concern  itself  with  the 
economic  and  social  welfare  of  each  and  every 
individual  member.  Society  controls  through  the 
state  one  of  the  great  institutions^ — the  school — 
which  molds,  develops  and  strengthens  its  future 
adult  members.  The  school  of  to-day  is  distinct- 
ively a  social  institution.  It  aims  at  producing 
more  than  the  intelligent  citizen;  it  also  seeks  to 
produce  the  efficient  worker,  the  efficient  consumer, 
the  morally  and  physically  well-developed  man  or 
woman.  Improvement  of  men,  environment  and 
institutions  are  the  three  prime  essentials  in  the 
betterment  of  society;  better  educational  methods 
and  ideals  are  necessary  in  order  that  the  work 
along  the  three  interrelated  lines  may  follow  the 
much  searched  after  path  of  least  resistance.  True 
education  in  the  broadest  sense  of  the  term,  in- 
volving both  teaching  and  research,  which  is  con- 
cerned with  the  improvement  of  men,  the  material 
and  social  environment,  and  of  the  legal,  economic, 
political  and  religious  institutions  is  then  the  vital 
and  fundamental  problem  of  modern  times.  To 
vitalize  education,  to  keep  it  abreast  with  the 
demands  of  our   social  and  industrial  life  is  the 

14 


INTRODUCTION 

problem  which  now  confronts  us;  and  much  has 
been  accomplished  in  recent  years. 

In  the  case  of  a  primitive  people  where  division 
of  labor  was  not  practised  to  any  important  degree, 
all  received  practically  the  same  training.  Each 
was.  his  own  carpenter,  farmer,  smith  and  hunter. 
The  duties  of  one  man  were  similar  in  character 
and  importance  to  those  of  any  other  member  of  the 
tribe  or  horde.  In  the  case  of  modern  society  this 
is  entirely  changed.  Differentiation  of  occupation 
is  the  basis  upon  which  the  complex  structure  of 
modern  society  is  erected.  In  recent  years  the 
feeling  that  education  is  not  accomplishing  its  true 
mission  has  manifested  itself  in  a  variety  of  forms. 
There  has  been  a  groping  in  the  dark  for  something 
which  will  allow  our  educational  system  to  supply 
those  forms  of  training  which  recent  industrial 
change  and  progress  have  caused  to  be  dropped 
from  the  life  of  the  average  man.  This  groping 
in  the  dark  is  the  result  of  the  emphatic  demand 
by  the  masses  of  the  people  for  a  "practical"  edu- 
cation,— something  which  will  aid  them  in  their 
struggle  for  a  livelihood.  Advocates  of  the  old, 
purely  intellectual  education  may  scoff  at  this  in- 
novation, this  so-called  debasement  of  educational 
ideals,  this  catering. to  the  "common  herd";  but  it 
is  demanded  by  the  great  mass  of  citizens  whose 
will  is  registered  at  the  polls  and  in  the  great  arena 
of  public  opinion.  A  new  class  is  rising  into  the 
saddle.  The  public  schools  and  the  state  univer- 
sities are  the  most  susceptible  to  public  opinion, 
and  in  these  we  find  the  greatest  progress.     Private 

IS 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

institutions,  supported  by  endowments  and  private 
beneficence,  are  normally  the  strongholds  of  con- 
servatism in  education  and  in  economic  thought; 
but,  on  the  other  hand,  private  initiative  usually 
clears  the  path  for  public  action.  Manual  training, 
nature  study,  kindergartens,  night  schools,  evening 
lectures,  correspondence  schools  and  play  grounds 
are  some  of  the  direct  results  of  educational  agita- 
tion and  unrest.  These  measures,  while  valuable 
and  desirable,  do  not  go  to  the  root  of  the  evil. 
We  must  reach  the  large  percentage  of  American 
children  who  leave  school  at  an  early  age ;  we  must 
place  practical,  industrial  and  general  education 
within  the  reach  of  the  boy  or  the  girl  who  is 
working,  and  it  must  be  made  to  be  an  advantage 
to  him  or  her  to  accept  it;  we  must  modify  our 
conception  of  the  aims,  methods,  and  ideals  of 
education. 

Education  is  a  fundamental  measure  by  means 
of  which  the  mass  of  the  people  can  be  helped; 
and  that  education  is  best  which  treats  of  those 
things  which  are  near  to  and  easily  attainable  by 
the  masses.  Classical  and  cultural  studies  are  per- 
haps ideals  toward  which  we  may  gradually  bend 
our  efforts;  but  high  and  lofty  ideals  as  portrayed 
in  art  and  literature  do  not  appeal  to  the  man  who 
is  seeking  a  job,  or  to  the  one  who  needs  to  know 
how  to  use  his  hands.  Attention  must  first  be  paid 
to  those  things  close  to  the  every-day  life  of  the 
poorer  classes ;  we  must  utilize  the  threads  of  ex- 
perience obtained  by  them  in  their  daily  life. 
Improvement  of  the  individual  is  not  a  universal 

i6 


INTRODUCTION 

panacea  for  all  the  ills  of  our  social  and  industrial 
life;  but  until  measures  are  taken  to  educate  the 
great  masses  of  the  people  for  industrial  life,  other 
desirable  measures  are  rendered  practically  futile. 
The  latter  resemble  efforts  to  purify  a  putrid  stream 
directed  at  a  point  far  below  the  source  of  pollution. 
The  efforts  of  reformers  of  all  kinds,  of  labor 
unions,  of  charitable  enterprises,  and  of  philan- 
thropic individuals  are  only  of  comparatively  little 
value  while  a  great  mass  of  inefficient,  unskilled, 
ignorant  people  contented  with  a  low  standard  of 
living  exist.  Education  of  the  industrial  and  social 
type  can  go  to  one  of  the  sources  of  the  difficulty, 
and  enable  other  essential  measures  to  obtain  more 
efficient  results. 

In  the  past,  nations  and  races  have  unceasingly 
passed  through  a  cycle  which  led  finally  to  de- 
generacy, decay  and  subjection  to  stronger,  more 
virile,  because  more  primitive,  races.  In  the  United 
States  the  enormous  increase  in  wealth  and  the 
enlargement  of  the  leisure  class,  especially  in  the 
case  of  the  weaker  sex,  indicate  that  this  nation  is 
reaching  a  point  in  her  national  history  which,  if 
she  is  to  follow  the  cycle  traced  by  older  nations, 
presages  national  degeneration.  '  The  problem  of 
the  twentieth  century  is  to  make  education  an 
engine  for  social  betterment.  Hitherto,  educa- 
tional progress  has  been  conditioned  by  economic 
and  social  changes.  Have  we  advanced  far  enough 
on  the  path  of  civilization  to  make  it,  in  a  measure, 
a  directive  agent? — is  the  question.  Only  through 
the  study  of  industrial  evolution  can  we  hope  to 

2  17 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

discover  the  lines  of  development  which  lie  just 
ahead,  and  thus  be  enabled  to  utilize  education  in 
order  to  hasten  social  progress.  Any  modern  edu- 
cational theory  which  does  not  rest  back  upon  the 
basis  of  social  and  economic  needs  and  progress  is 
sterile  and  unscientific.  If  pedagogy  or  education 
is  to  be  permanently  ranked  among  the  sciences, 
it  must  find  data  in  addition  to  that  furnished  by 
cultural  imperatives  and  psychological  investiga- 
tions. 


i8 


PARTI 

THE  MODERN  EDUCATIONAL 
PROBLEM 


CHAPTER   II 

EDUCATIONAL  EPOCHS  IN  THE  UNITED 
STATES 

Although  our  public-school  system  is  in  some 
respects  the  most  characteristic  of  all  American 
mstitutions,  a  careful  study  of  the  fundamental, 
underlying  forces  which  produced  our  educational 
progress  has  not  yet  been  published.  Few  attempts 
have  been  made  to  study  the  forces  or  combina- 
tion of  forces  which  produced  the  transformation 
from  the  narrowly  intellectual,  semi-private,  semi- 
religious  basis  upon  which  education  rested  during 
the  colonial  period,  to  the  broad  intellectual,  indus- 
trial and  social  basis  upon  which  the  public-school 
system  of  to-day  is  placed.  The  world's  progress  is 
accomplished  not  by  steady,  stately  strides,  but  by 
leaps  and  bounds  separated  by  periods  of  com- 
parative quiescence  or  even  of  apparent  retrogres- 
sion. In  like  manner  our  educational  advancement 
which  is  a  resultant  of  our  industrial  and  social 
development,  is  not  uniform  but  irregular.  Edu- 
cational progress  is  slow  during  one  period,  and 
rapid  during  another  epoch.  Educational  progress 
is  secondary  to  industrial  and  social  advance,  and 
consequently  lags  somewhat  behind  it  in  point  of 
time.    Periods  of  greatest   economic   activity  are 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

followed  some  years  later  by  educational  activity, 
unless  some  disturbance  or  agitation  turns  the  cur- 
rent into  other  channels.  Education  is  ever  vainly 
attempting  to  catch  up  with  the  car  of  progress. 
It  follows  industrial  change  as  would  a  freight  car 
follow  a  locomotive,  if  attached  to  the  latter  by  a 
long  elastic  coupling.  The  engine  would,  in  start- 
ing, move  much  faster  than  the  car,  but  when 
approaching  its  destination  the  car  would  move 
more  rapidly  than  the  engine.  Educational  aims, 
ideals  and  methods  are  farthest  out  of  step  with 
the  needs  of  the  time  when  near  the  close  of  a 
period  of  prosperity,  at  a  time  when  business  and 
industrial  activity  is  at  its  height.  Educational  his- 
tory should  be  an  orderly  account  of  the  educational 
needs,  and  of  the  progressive  and  conservative 
forces  which  mold  the  educational  institutions  of 
different  historic  periods. 

At  least  three  distinct  periods  or  epochs  in  the 

£/'**♦*•  development  of  our  educational  system  may  readily 
be  discerned,  and  it  is  probable  that  we  are  entering 

■jo-ni^upon  a  fourth.  These  periods  are  eras  of  edu- 
cational agitation  and  progress.     In  the  intervals 

•i»-  /^^  ''■  between  two  epochs,  progress  is  slower  or  not  dis- 
cernable.    The  early  educational  activity  in  New 

'*^'''*^*  England   constitutes  the  first   epoch.      It  includes 

^  _  the  latter  portion  of  the  seventeenth  century  and 
the  opening  years  of  the  eighteenth.  The  "Edu- 
cational Revival"  of  1820  to  1850  clearly  constitutes 
the  second  epoch.  The  third  extends  from  approxi- 
mately 1875  to  1895  or  1900;  and  the  fourth  period, 
if  such  there  is,  began  with  the  new  century.     In 


EDUCATIONAL    EPOCHS 

the  first  two  periods  education  was  purely  an 
intellectual  matter.  The  common  school  was  only 
utilized  to  teach  reading,  writing  and  arithmetic. 
Not  until  the  later  years  of  the  second  period  did 
history,  geography  or  grammar  find  a  place  in  the 
curriculum  of  the  majority  of  the  elementary 
schools.  In  the  third  period  industrial  and  scientific 
education  arises;  manual  training,  domestic  science, 
nature  study,  elementary  physics  and  chemistry, 
and  other  branches  of  study  are  introduced  into 
the  curriculum.  In  the  fourth  period  education 
assumes  a  distinctly  paternalistic  attitude  toward 
the  child ;  it  is  now  considered  to  be  an  integral  and 
vital  part  of  the  life  of  every  human  being.  "Edu- 
cation is  life." 

The  discussion  of  the  first  period  may  be  con- 
fined entirely  to  New  England.  The  early  New 
England  settlers  were,  with  unimportant  excep- 
tions, middle-class  Englishmen  who  were  Calvinists. 
These  settlers  were  a  sturdy,  independent  class  of 
men  and  women.  The  Norman  conquest  trans- 
planted to  England  a  new  feudal  aristocracy,  and 
gradually  changed  the  "Old-English  thanehood 
into  the  finest  class  of  rural  gentry  and  yeomen 
that  has  ever  existed  in  any  country."^  Social 
diflferentiation  was  not  considerable  until  after  the 
Revolution.  The  colonists  brought  with  them 
English  customs,  traditions,  law  and  government. 
These  institutions  were  modified  to  meet  the  wants 
of  a  new  environment  far  from  the  interfering 
hand  of  the  English   government.    In  short,  the 

*John  Fiske,  The  Beginnings  of  New  England,  p.  30 
23 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

colonists  tried  to  make  New  England  an  improved 
and  purified  copy  of  Old  England.  While  they 
accepted  and  adhered  to  many  radical  doctrines  as 
to  the  rights  of  man,  they  continued  the  English 
common  law  with  important  modifications,  they 
restricted  the  suffrage,  and  they  did  not  hesitate 
to  imprison  debtors.  England  experienced,  from 
the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  century  and  into  the 
early  part  of  the  seventeenth  century,  an  im- 
portant educational  awakening;  many  schools, 
chiefly  grammar,  were  established  to  take  the  place 
of  those  destroyed  when  the  monasteries  were  sup- 
pressed.^ The  Puritans  had  been  accustomed  to 
schools,  and  consequently  soon  after  their  arrival 
on  New  England  soil  the  formation  of  a  school 
system  was  attempted. 

The  belief  in  Calvinism  was  an  important  factor 
in  the  educational  history  of  this  early  epoch. 
"One  of  the  cardinal  requirements  of  democratic 
Calvinism  has  always  been  elementary  education 
for  everybody.  In  matters  of  religion  all  souls  are 
equally  concerned  and  each  individual  is  ultimately 
responsible  for  himself.  The  Scriptures  are  the 
rule  of  life,  and  accordingly  each  individual  ought 
to  be  able  to  read  them  for  himself,  without  de- 
pendence upon  priests.  Hence,  it  is  one  of  the 
prime  duties  of  a  congregation  to  insist  that  all 
members  shall  know  how  to  read,  and,  if  necessary, 
to  provide  them  with  requisite  instruction.  In 
accordance  with  this  Calvinistic  idea  some  form  of 

*Jos.  Shafer,  The  Origin  of  the  System  of  Land  Grants 
for  Education. 

24 


EDUCATIONAL    EPOCHS 

universal  and  compulsory  education  sprang  up  dur- 
ing the  Sixteenth  and  Seventeenth  centuries  wher- 
ever Calvinism  had  become  dominant, — in  the 
Protestant  parts  of  France  and  Switzerland,  in 
Scotland,  in  the  Netherlands,  and  in  New  Eng- 
land."^ Calvinism  "has  proved  one  of  the  chief 
forces  on  promoting  the  education  of  the  common 
people,  and  in  fostering  higher  education  in  the 
modern  world. "2  The  English  people  "had  also 
a  strong  feeling  of  the  solidarity  of  responsibility 
which  emphasized  the  evils  inflicted  upon  the  whole 
people,  by  the  wrong  acts  of  individuals  and  the 
need  of  national  unity."^  This  feeling  of  mutual 
responsibility  played  a  considerable  role  in  pro- 
moting education ;  and  the  weakening  of  the  ties 
as  the  settlements  grew  larger  and  more  numerous, 
and  as  the  settlers  became  more  and  more  inde- 
pendent of  each  other,  partially  accounts  for  the 
relatively  diminished  interest  in  education  of  a 
later  period.  This  clannish  feeling  found  expres- 
sion in  the  first  educational  enactment  passed  in 
Massachusetts  in  1642.  The  selectmen  of  the  towns 
were  given  power  to  investigate  as  to  the  training 
of  all  children  under  their  jurisdiction,  and  au- 
thority was  granted  to  impose  fines  upon  any  and 
all.  persons  who  refused  to  educate  their  children, 
or  to  render  an  account,  when  demanded,  to  the 
selectmen.  Indeed,  this  act  amounted  to  a  com- 
pulsory  educational   law,    but   it   did   not   provide 

*Fiske,    The    Dutch    and    Quaker    Colonies    in    America, 
Vol.  1:33. 

^  New  International  Encyclopedia,  article  on  Calvinism. 
'Patten,  Development  of  English  Thought,  p.  120. 
25 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

teachers  or  schools.  Education  was  left  to  home 
instruction,  private  tutors,  or  private  schools.  It 
was  held  that  every  head  of  a  family  was  in  duty 
bound  to  educate  his  children  in  order  to  promote 
the  moral  and  religious  well-being  of  the  com- 
munity. 

This  act  was  similar  in  its  nature  to  our  modern 
sanitary  laws  which  require  every  householder  to 
keep  his  house  and  yard  in  a  healthful  and  clean 
condition  so  that  his  home  will  not  become  a 
menace  to  the  community,  and  a  focus  of  infection. 
Elementary  education  was  at  this  time  in  the  handi- 
craft or  household  stage,  and  was  primarily  de- 
manded for  religious  reasons.  Family  instruction 
was  sometimes  supplemented  by  the  work  of  teach- 
ers who  gathered  a  few  children  about  them. 
Teaching  was  carried  on  much  as  was  shoemaking 
or  tailoring.  The  teacher  found  his  counterpart 
in  the  itinerant  journeyman  of  the  period.  Indeed, 
public  bounty  was  first  extended  by  the  General 
Court,  not  to  what  we  now  call  the  common  schools, 
but  to  the  colleges.  However,  a  few  years  later, 
in  1647,  the  date  of  the  second  Massachusetts  law, 
we  find  supplemented  by  family  instruction,  "the 
outlines  of  a  complete  system  of  popular  education 
in  Massachusetts — the  elementary,  the  grammar  or 
secondary  schools  and  the  college — all  supported 
by  the  contributions  of  the  people,  private  benefi- 
cence, public  taxation  and  legislative  grants."* 
Towns  of  one  hundred  householders  were  ordered 
to  set  up  a  grammar  school  or  pay  a  fine.     In  1671 

*  Report  of  the  Bureau  of  Education,  1893-1894. 
26 


EDUCATIONAL    EPOCHS 

and  again  in  1683  the  penalties  for  non-compliance 
with  this  statute  were  increased.  The  first  period 
was  distinctly  a  middle-class  educational  era. 
There  was  in  fact  no  other  influential  class  in  the 
community.  The  important  and  characteristic 
grade  of  schools  during  this  epoch  was  the  gram- 
mar school. 

The  town  was  the  original  unit  in  school  govern- 
ment; but  the  system  of  local  control  and  the 
strong  bias  against  anything  savoring  of  centralized 
authority  led  to  the  further  subdivision  into  school 
districts  for  the  purpose  of  directing  educational 
affairs.  With  the  development  of  the  district  sys- 
tem naturally  and  inevitably  came  the  decline  of 
the  famous  grammar  school  and  the  rise  of  the 
private  academy.  This  marks  the  beginning  of  an 
educational  declension  which,  it  has  been  asserted, 
set  in  before  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century. 
"This  declension  is  commonly  ascribed  to  the  wars 
with  the  Indians  and  the  French  that  wasted  the 
blood  and  treasure  of  the  colony;  the  political  and 
social  contentions  that  disturbed  its  peace;  the  un- 
certain relations  that  existed  between  Massachusetts 
and  the  Mother  Country,  and  internal  economic 
and  social  changes."^  The  powers  granted  to 
school  districts  were  gradually  increased  down  to 
about  1826.  At  which  time  only  two  limitations 
were  placed  upon  their  authority  in  regard  to  the 
management  of  the  schools  of  the  district:  (i) 
The  raising  and  apportionment  of  taxes,  and  (2) 
the    qualifications    of    teachers.      This    marks    the 

'  Hinsdale,  Early  Education  in  Massachusetts,  p.  9. 
27 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

extreme  limit  of  decentralization  in  school  affairs. 
The  academy  is  simply  a  visible  token  of  the  decline 
of  the  grammar  school,  and  shows  that  the 
wealthier  members  of  the  community  wished  to 
obtain  better  education  for  their  children  than  could 
be  received  in  the  district  schools.  So  while  on  the 
one  hand  the  district  system  led  toward  democracy, 
on  the  other  it  increased  class  differentiation  and 
antagonism.  The  demand  for  centralization  which 
came  with  the  second  epoch,  commonly  called  the 
period  of  educational  revival,  was  coincident  with 
the  growth  of  cities,  the  increase  of  manufacture 
and  of  mutual  interdependence.  The  interdepend- 
ence of  this  era  was  due  to  the  birth  of  division  of 
labor  and  specialization  of  industry,  and  led  even- 
tually to  what  the  socialists  call  "class  conscious- 
ness." Horace  Mann  "stands  in  history  as  the 
representative  of  the  urban  school."  The  culmina- 
tion of  the  development  of  the  district  is  con- 
temporaneous with  the  high  water  mark  in  New 
England  of  individualism,  the  theory  of  natural 
rights  and  of  a  laisse  faire  policy.  The  second  edu- 
cational period  ushers  in  the  demand  for  centralized 
school  administration,  tax-supported  free  element- 
ary schools,  and  protection  to  American  industries. 
The  period  of  declension  was  an  era  of  transition. 
Invention  and  progress  in  industry  undermined  the 
authority  of  the  theocratic  element  and  correspond- 
ingly increased  the  influence  of  the  manufacturing 
and  artisan  classes. 

The  causes  of  this  phenomenon  may  be   sum- 
marized as  follows:   (i)   Wars  and  internal  dis- 


EDUCATIONAL    EPOCHS 

sentions,  and  the  formation  of  a  new  government, 
distracted  the  attention  from  the  field  of  education, 
(2)  The  growth  of  the  district  system  of  educa- 
tional administration  injured  especially  the  grade 
of  schools  which  had  been  considered  most  im- 
portant, namely,  the  grammar  schools.  (3)  De- 
crease of  mutual  interdependence  among  the  settlers 
and  the  consequent  diminution  in  the  strength  of 
the  spirit  of  clannishness.  (4)  Industrial  progress 
which  produced  a  new  alignment  of  classes.  At 
the  end  of  this  period  of  educational  decline  we  find 
James  G.  Carter  saying:  "Under  our  present  con- 
stitution, or  for  the  last  forty  years,  the  schools 
have  no  doubt  been  vastly  improved.  But  they 
have,  most  certainly,  not  kept  up  with  the  progress 
of  society  in  other  respects.  Although  their  abso- 
lute motion  must  be  acknowledged  to  have  been 
onward,  their  relative  motion  has  for  many  years 
been  retrograde.  And  there  never  was  a  time, 
since  the  settlement  of  this  country,  when  the  com- 
mon schools  were  farther  in  the  rear  of  the  im- 
provements of  the  age  in  almost  everything  else 
affecting  our  condition  and  happiness  than  they  are 
at  the  present  moment."^ 

The  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century  wit- 
nessed the  gradual  destruction  of  domestic  industry 
and  the  development  of  the  factory  system.  Im- 
provements and  inventions  in  various  lines  of 
manufacture  and  communication  followed  each 
other  in  rapid  succession.  The  Embargo  Act,  the 
War  of  181 2,  the  shipping  regulations  of  foreign 

*"The  Schools  in  1824,"  Old  South  Leaflets,  No.  135. 
29 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

nations  adopted  subsequent  to  the  war,  and  the 
westward  movement  tended  to  rapidly  shift  capital 
and  enterprise,  particularly  in  New  England,  from 
commerce  to  manufacture.  Canal  and  railroad 
building  followed,  immigration  multiplied  rapidly, 
the  towns  increased  in  size  and  importance,  manu- 
facture became  an  important  economic  interest.  In 
1790  Massachusetts  had  a  population  of  378,787 
souls;  fifty  years  later,  in  1840,  the  number  was 
737,700,  an  increase  of  94.75  per  cent.  During 
the  same  period  the  city  of  Boston  increased  in 
population  409.73  per  cent.  The  number  of  people 
engaged  in  manufacture  in  Massachusetts  increased 
from  33,464  in  1820,  to  85,176  in  1840;  in  Rhode 
Island,  from  6,091  to  21,271 ;  in  New  York,  from 
60,038  to  173,193;  or  the  numbers  engaged  in 
manufacture  in  the  three  states  were  approximately 
trebled  in  a  score  of  years.  In  Massachusetts  dur- 
ing the  same  period  the  number  of  persons  engaged 
in  commerce  decreased  from  13,301  to  8,063 ;  and 
the  number  engaged  in  agriculture  increased  from 
63,460  to  87,837.  In  New  York,  in  1840,  only 
28,468  persons  were  engaged  in  commercial  pur- 
suits.* Such  sweeping  changes  in  social  and  indus- 
trial conditions  is  indicative  of  unrest  and  agitation. 
This  was  an  intensely  dynamic  period ;  social  ideals, 
home  life,  customs,  are  all  subjected  to  new  in- 
fluences. 

By  1830  imprisonment  for  debt  was  practically 
abolished,  manhood  suffrage  was  attained  in  nearly 

*  See  Tucker,  Progress  of  the  United  States ;  and  Chick- 
ering.  On  Population  and  Immigration. 
30 


EDUCATIONAL    EPOCHS 

all  states,  and  the  Congressional  Caucus  had  dis- 
appeared. Following  the  hard  times  of  1819-1821, 
arose  the  great  humanitarian  movements  of  the 
epoch,  including,  among  others,  the  development  of 
labor  organizations,  the  communistic  settlement 
movement,  and  the  demand  for  public  tax-supported 
schools.  Many  of  the  humanitarian  movements 
led  directly  to,  or  were  finally  overshadowed  by, 
the  anti-slavery  agitation  of  the  period  immediately 
preceding  the  Civil  War.  At  this  time  in  the  face 
of  the  westward  migration  and  under  normal  con- 
ditions, the  labor  movement  could  not  attain  great 
strength.  The  demand  for  tax-supported  schools, 
however,  succeeded  in  the  northern  and  western 
states.  This  period  of  educational  awakening  and 
social  agitation  established  this  principle  in  these 
sections  of  the  United  States  so  firmly  that  it  has 
never  been  dislodged,  and  it  is  not  now  questioned. 
Education  was  transferred  from  a  charity  or  rate 
basis  to  a  free  public  system  supported  by  taxation, 
and  it  was  completely  severed  from  religious 
control. 

The  arguments  which  were  presented  during  this 
period  of  agitation  in  favor  of  free  tax-supported 
schools  may  be  summarized  as  follows:  (i)  Edu- 
cation increases  production.  (2)  It  diminishes 
crime.  (3)  It  prevents  poverty.  (4)  Education 
is  a  natural  right  of  all  men.  (5)  Universal  edu- 
cation is  necessary  to  preserve  free  republican 
institutions.  (6)  Free  schools  prevent  class  dif- 
ferentiation. The  first  three  arguments  are  eco- 
nomic  and   appealed   to   practically   all   reputable 

31 


?^ 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

citizens;  the  fourth  put  the  matter  on  an  ethical 
basis  and  invoked  the  authority  of  the  Declaration 
of  Independence  and  of  other  Revolutionary  litera- 
ture. It  received  the  support  of  the  laboring  classes 
and  of  the  humanitarians  of  the  period.  The  last 
two  arguments  were  urged  from  a  civic  standpoint. 
The  last  three  arguments,  particularly  the  fourth 
and  the  sixth,  did  not  receive  the  hearty  support  of 
the  wealthy,  large  tax-paying  class.  In  general, 
remembering  that  there  are  exceptions,  we  may 
characterize  the  opposing  forces  as  follows :  In 
favor  of  tax-supported  public  education  for  all 
children,  the  workingmen  and  non-taxpayers,  the 
;  cities,  and  the  Calvinists ;  opposed  to  this  system  of 
\^  schools,  the  upper  classes  and  the  taxpayers,  the 
rural  districts,  and  the  Lutherans,  Quakers  and 
similar  sects.  Such  a  statement,  so  contrary  to 
many  preconceived  notions,  is  supported  by  a  mass 
of  details.  Only  a  portion  of  the  evidence  can  be 
here  presented. 

The  attention  should  first  be  called  to  the  evident 
fact  that  the  progress  of  the  world  for  centuries 
has  been  toward  the  betterment  of  the  working 
classes;  therefore  it  seems  reasonable  to  argue 
a  priori  that,  if  progress  continues,  the  program  of 
the  working  people  and  non-property  owners  of 
one  generation  will  be  partially,  at  least,  adopted 
by  all  classes  of  society  in  the  next.  As  long  as 
progress  is  synonymous  with  the  uplift  of  the 
workers  and  the  downtrodden,  so  long  will  their 
program,  rather  than  that  of  the  business  or  profes- 
sional men,  represent  progress.    The  latter  classes 

32 


EDUCATIONAL    EPOCHS 

in  the  community  act  as  a  flywheel  which  steadies 
progress  and  prevents  disaster;  but  they  always 
stand  for  controlling  or  modifying,  not  impelling, 
forces.  This  view  is  particularly  illuminating  when 
we  take  up  the  consideration  of  the  present  period 
of  educational  development. 

During  the  20's  and  30's,  labor  union  after  labor 
union  formally  declared  in  favor  of  free  universal 
education.  Many  periodicals  sprang  into  existence 
to  press  these  demands.  In  November,  1829,  at  a 
meeting  of  organized  workers  in  New  York,  reso- 
lutions were  adopted  demanding  for  every  child  "a 
complete  and  systematic  course  of  instruction, — 
at  public  expense."  They  urged  "that  the  public 
funds  should  be  appropriated  (to  a  reasonable  ex- 
tent) to  the  progress  of  education  upon  a  regular 
system  that  shall  insure  to  every  individual  the 
opportunity  of  obtaining  a  competent  education 
before  he  shall  have  arrived  at  maturity."  As  early 
as  1799  the  Mechanic's  Association  of  Providence 
demanded  free  public  schools.  The  Equal  Rights 
Party  of  New  York  City,  among  other  things, 
pledged  (1837)  themselves  "to  procure  a  more 
extended,  equal  and  convenient  system  of  common 
school  instruction."  Stephen  Simpson  in  his  book 
entitled,  A  Manual  for  Workingmen,  presents 
the  following  view  of  the  situation  in  183 1 :  "The 
text  of  the  friends  of  liberty  was — to  enlighten  the 
people  is  to  promote  and  cement  the  public  virtue. 
The  soundness  of  this  text  was  never  questioned 
anterior  to  the  organization  of  a  party  [the  Work- 
ingmen's  Party],  whose  object  it  was  to  obtain  it 
3  33 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

from  the  legislature,  as  a  right  unjustly  withheld. 
When  public  instruction  was  bestowed  as  a  boon 
of  charity,  it  found  numerous  advocates  and  met 
with  no  opponents ;  but  now,  when  we  justly  demand 
it  as  a  right  and  not  as  a  charity — it  is  not  only 
refused  by  some,  but  to  our  utter  amazement,  its 
consequences  painted  as  baleful  to  the  people  and 
deprecated  as  having  a  fatal  tendency  upon  the 
good  order  of  government."  It  is  needless  further 
to  enumerate  the  resolutions  passed  by  workingmen 
and  their  representatives,  but  it  seems  appropriate  to 
introduce  the  testimony  of  T.  H.  Green  as  to  the 
forces  which  promoted  public  education  in  England. 
"If  factory  regulation  had  been  attempted,  though 
only  in  piece-meal  way,  some  time  before  we  had  a 
democratic  house  of  commons,  the  same  can  not  be 
said  of  the  educational  law.  It  was  the  parliament 
elected  by  the  more  popular  suffrage  in  1868  that 
passed,  as  we  know,  the  first  great  educational  act. 
That  act  introduced  compulsory  schooling." 

In  the  cities  a  large  percentage  of  the  people  were 
workingmen  and  small  taxpayers,  and  in  the  cities 
the  need  of  educational  facilities  was  clearly  urgent. 
There  were  also  better  opportunities  in  the  cities  for 
carrying  on  an  agitation  on  this,  or  any  other  sub- 
ject. If  we  omit  for  the  present  Pennsylvania, 
where  religious  and  national  differences  compli- 
cated the  question,  the  antagonism  is  quite  clearly 
marked  between  the  cities  and  rural  districts.  In 
1799,  in  Rhode  Island,  a  local  option  school  law 
was  passed.  Providence  alone  took  advantage  of 
this  law.     Four  years  later  it  was  repealed  by  the 

34 


EDUCATIONAL    EPOCHS 

votes  of  the  remainder  of  the  state.  The  first  free 
schools  in  Pennsylvania  were  provided  in  the  city 
of  Philadelphia.  New  York  State,  however,  offers 
the  most  convincing  and  spectacular  example  of 
the  antagonism  between  the  cities  and  the  rural  dis- 
tricts in  regard  to  tax-supported  public  schools. 
In  March,  1849,  the  New  York  legislature  passed 
an  "Act  establishing  free  schools  throughout  the 
State."  The  schools  were  to  be  free  to  all  persons 
between  the  ages  of  five  and  twenty-one.  Local 
taxation  was  provided  to  supplement  the  state  tax. 
A  referendum  was  allowed  on  this  proposed  law; 
the  vote  was  249,872  for,  and  91,951  against,  the 
law.  Four  rural  counties  only  gave  majorities 
unfavorable  to  the  law.  In  New  York  county  the 
vote  was  21,052  for,  and  only  1,313  against.  When, 
however,  an  attempt  was  made  to  put  the  law  in 
operation,  much  hostility  was  manifested.  "Many 
of  the  heaviest  taxpayers  had  no  direct  interest  in 
the  schools;  and  in  general  wherever  they  consti- 
tuted a  majority  of  the  legal  voters  of  a  district,  they 
refused  all  appropriations  for  the  support  of  the 
school  beyond  the  four  months  required  by  law."* 
In  1850  the  question  of  a  repeal  of  this  law  was 
referred  to  the  people.  Forty-two  out  of  fifty-nine 
counties  favored  the  repeal,  but  the  large  majority 
given  by  the  remaining  seventeen  was  sufficient  to 
prevent  such  action.  The  cities  of  New  York, 
Brooklyn,  Albany,  Buffalo,  Schenectady,  and  Syra- 
cuse were  located  in  these  counties.     These  cities 

'  Randall,  Common  School  System  of  New  York. 
35 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

prevented  the  repeal  of  this  law;  the  issue  was 
clearly  drawn. 

Pennsylvania  passed  through  a  similar  experience 
in  1834  and  1835.  The  law  passed  in  1834  en- 
countered bitter  opposition.  "There  were  taxes, 
and  there  is  no  more  certain  method  of  stirring  up 
the  public  opinion  of  a  virtuous,  thrifty  and  frugal 
people,  such  as  then  inhabited  Pennsylvania,  than 
by  pricking  their  pocketbooks.  They  were  willing 
to  have  reform,  provided  it  did  not  come  high,  or 
they  were  not  compelled  to  pay  for  it.  A  violent 
reaction  arose.  Nearly  half  of  the  districts  in  the 
State  rejected  the  act  or  contemptuously  ignored 
it."^  Another  phase  of  the  opposition  exhibits  a 
striking  similarity  to  the  present  opposition  to  legal 
limitations  of  the  hours  of  labor  and  to  other  laws 
relating  to  the  working  people.  "But  these  oppon- 
ents of  free  education  object  to  any  compulsory 
proceedings  on  the  part  of  the  State,  alleging  that 
a  law  of  this  character,  if  passed,  would  be  in  viola- 
tion of  the  liberty  of  the  citizen,  who  has  a  right  to 
do  as  he  pleases,  to  worship  God  or  not,  as  he 
pleases,  to  educate  his  children  or  not,  as  he  pleases, 
and  to  live  free  from  any  restraint  of  any  kind, 
whether  civil  or  moral."^  Martin,  in  his  Evolution 
of  the  Massachusetts  School  System,  makes  the 
following  pertinent  observations:  "It  is  curious 
to  see  how  long  the  higher  social  circles  of  the 
commercial  towns — Boston,  Salem  and  Newbury- 
port — clung  to  the  old   traditions,   and  how   they 

*  McCall,  Life  of  Stevens,  p.  35. 
=  D.   B,  Duffield,  Barnard's  Journal,  Vol.  III. 
2>6 


EDUCATIONAL    EPOCHS 

resisted  the  encroachments  of  that  leveling  spirit 
which  would  break  down  the  old  social  barriers. 
Thus  in  Newburyport,  in  1790,  when  it  was  pro- 
posed to  open  primary  schools  for  girls  at  public 
expense,  the  school  committee  of  clergymen,  doc- 
tors, squires  and  captains  recommended  that  all 
girls  who  attended  these  schools  should  be  consid- 
ered as  recipients  of  public  charity.  This  the  town 
rejected."^ 

The   opposition   in   Pennsylvania   was    increased 
by  the  differences  in  nationalities  and  religious  be- 
liefs among  the  inhabitants.     Pennsylvania  was  set- 
tled  by   a   mixture   of   peoples,    speaking   different 
languages  and  adhering  to  different  religious  be- 
liefs.    "The  new  law   (1833-1834)   met  with  most 
favor  in  the  northern   counties.     These  had  been 
settled  principally  by  people   from   New  England 
and  New  York,  who  had  been  accustomed  to  public 
schools  and  understood  their  advantages.     It  was 
comparatively  well  received  in  the  counties  west  of 
the  Alleghanies,  where  a  diversity  of  wealth  had 
not  yet  bred  distinctions  of  class,  and  where  dif- 
ferent   nationalities    and    different     religious    de- 
nominations had  become  so  thoroughly  mixed  as  to 
recognize  an  educational  interest  in  common.     Op- 
position to  it  was  most  formidable  in  the  southern, 
central    and    southeastern    portions    of   the    State, 
and  greatest  of  all  in  the  counties  where  the  people 
were  principally  of  German  descent."^ 

*  Martin,  p.  143. 

*  Wickersham,   History   of  Education  in   Pennsylvania,   p. 
318. 

37 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

In  1835,  in  Pennsylvania,  the  Democratic  party 
was  split  into  two  factions;  the  question  of  free 
schools  was  one  of  the  points  of  difference.  The 
candidate  of  the  wing  opposing  free  schools  was 
Rev.  H.  A.  Muhlenberg,  a  Lutheran  clergyman. 
This  gentleman  in  a  letter  to  the  workingmen  of 
Philadelphia,  January  1836,  stated  the  position  of  his 
countrymen  thus:  "The  Germans  of  our  State  are 
not  opposed  to  education  as  such,  but  only  to  any 
system  which  seems  to  trench  on  their  parental  and 
natural  rights."  As  early  as  1786  this  prayer  was 
introduced  into  the  litany  of  the  Lutheran  church: 
"And  since  it  has  pleased  Thee  chiefly,  by  means 
of  the  Germans,  to  transform  this  State..,  into,  a 
blooming  garden,  and  the  desert  into  a  pleasant 
pasture,  help  us  not  to  deny  our  nation,  but  to 
endeavor  that  our  youth  may  be  so  educated  that 
German  schools  and  churches  may  not  only  be 
sustained,  but  may  attain  a  still  more  flourishing 
condition."^  Another  writer  on  education  in  Penn- 
sylvania tells  us  that  "schools  supported  by  the 
public  were  opposed  by  many  of  the  wealthy  class 
who  had  no  sympathy  with  the  doctrine  of  equality 
upon  which  the  free  schools  were  founded.  Sev- 
eral religious  denominations  opposed  the  proposed 
law,  since  they  were  already  maintaining  at  their 
own  expense  denominational  schools  for  the  pur- 
pose of  inculcating  the  precepts  of  their  faith. 
Many  persons  of  German  descent  combated  the 
free  school  idea  because  the  instruction  was  to  be 
given   in   the   English   language,   and   they   feared 

*  Quoted,  Kuhns,  German  in  Pennsylvania,  p.  117. 
38 


EDUCATIONAL    EPOCHS 

that  it  would  result  in  the  displacement  of  their 
mother-tongue."^  The  victory  for  the  free  schools 
was  won  in  Pennsylvania  by  the  New  England 
man  and  the  urban  centers. 

At  the  close  of  the  second  period  the  tax-sup- 
ported public  school  was  a  firmly  established  insti- 
tution. The  value  of  education  was  considered, 
during  this  epoch,  chiefly  from  three  points  of  view, 
economic,  civic,  and  ethical.  New  industrial  and 
social  conditions  caused  the  agitation  which  over- 
came the  opposition  and  transferred  education 
from  the  rate  or  charity  basis  to  a  free,  tax-sup- 
ported foundation.  Educational  advance  during 
the  period  may  be  directly  attributed  to  the  pressure 
of  the  working  class  and  the  urban  community. 
Following  the  close  of  the  second  period,  the 
slavery  agitation,  the  Civil  War  and  the  recon- 
struction so  absorbed  the  attention  of  the  public 
that,  for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  educational  progress 
was  slow  and  bore  no  important  fruit. 

The  third  epoch  is  a  revolutionary  era,  if  judged 
from  the  point  of  view  of  the  functions  of  the 
school.  The  second  period  is  especially  interesting 
to  the  student  of  economic  and  social  questions, 
while  the  third  presents  phases  which  attract  the  at- 
tention of  the  psychologist  and  the  educator.  Here- 
tofore education  had  been  purely  an  intellectual  drill 
and  discipline;  the  school  was  a  mere  intellectual 
gymnasium.  This  period  opens  by  placing  the  em- 
phasis upon  the  industrial  and  psychological  value  of 

*  Edmonds,  History  of  the  Central  High  School,  Phila- 
delphia, p.  21. 

39 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

school  work.  A  distinction  must  be  drawn  between 
the  economic  and  the  industrial  value  of  education. 
It  was  recognized  in  the  preceding  epoch  that  edu- 
cation increased  production,  but  its  beneficial  effect 
was  then  thought  of  as  a  secondary  matter,  or  as  a 
by-product.  The  educated  man  was  conceived  to 
possess  good  judgment  and  a  high  degree  of 
efficiency;  but  the  direct  education  of  the  hand  and 
eye  through  the  instrumentality  of  the  school  was 
not  considered  to  be  feasible  or  desirable.  This 
period  was  also  one  of  agitation  and  unrest.  It, 
like  the  second,  came  after  a  severe  depression 
which  had  been  preceded  by  a  war  and  a  period  of 
rapid  industrial  development.  The  most  important 
educational  innovations  of  the  period  are  the  gen- 
eral introduction  of  the  laboratory,  the  kinder- 
garten, drawing,  manual  training,  domestic  science 
and  physical  training.  The  industrial  changes 
which  followed  the  Civil  War  still  further  reduced 
the  educational  functions  of  the  workshop  and  of 
the  home.  Boys  were  growing  up  in  the  cities  with 
little  or  no  opportunity  to  practically  or  regularly 
use  hand  and  eye  in  a  useful  or  productive  way, 
or  to  come  into  contact  with  industrial  operations. 
The  school  was  obliged  to  take  up  new  functions, 
to  do  much  of  the  work  formerly  done  by  the  home 
and  the  shop.  The  school  now  becomes  a  powerful 
institution  which  molds  the  life,  character  and 
industrial  capabilities  of  the  youth.  Every  increase 
in  its  function  and  policy  means  a  further  departure 
from  the  old  laisse  faire  policy.  It  is  worthy  of 
notice  that  at  the  time  when  manual  training  was 

40 


EDUCATIONAL    EPOCHS 

beginning  to  be  introduced  into  the  public  schools, 
the  American  Economic  Association  was  founded. 
This  association  has  stood  from  its  inception  for  an 
extension  of  the  power  of  the  state  and  opposed  to 
the  laisse  faire  poHcy  of  the  classical  economists. 

The  introduction  of  new  functions  into  the  public- 
school  system  has  not  been  accomplished  without 
opposition.  Manual  training  and  laboratory  work 
have,  however,  generally  received  the  hearty  sup- 
port of  the  manufacturers,  and  the  cooperation  of 
the  merchants  has  been  secured  through  the  addi- 
tion of  commercial  branches.  Labor  unionists  and 
unaffiliated  workingmen  have  not  as  a  rule  actively 
urged  the  adoption  of  manual  training.  They  have 
felt  that  the  work  given  was  impractical,  or,  if 
practical,  that  it  tended  to  increase  competition  in 
certain  trades.  They  have,  however,  favored  the 
introduction  of  the  kindergarten,  and  provisions 
for  free  text-books.  The  workingmen  have  turned 
to  private  correspondence  schools  for  practical 
assistance;  but,  in  the  near  future,  continuation 
schools  modeled  after  those  of  Europe  will  prob- 
ably be  included  in  the  public  system.  When  this 
is  accomplished  the  sphere  of  usefulness  of  the 
correspondence  school  will  be  contracted. 

It  was  during  the  third  epoch  that  the  new  science 
of  pedagogy,  if  we  may  dignify  it  by  the  name  of 
science,  put  forth  its  first  shoots.  The  old  "reser- 
voir" notion  as  to  educational  methods  became 
obsolete;  education  grew  to  be  something  more 
than  cramming  facts  and  syntax.  The  child  came 
to  be  recognized  as  a  growing  plant  which  must  be 

41 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

supplied,  if  he  is  to  develop  properly,  with  certain 
material  which  must  be  presented  in  the  proper 
form  and  at  the  proper  time ;  and  it  was  further 
perceived  that  the  work  of  the  school  was  condi- 
tioned by,  and  dependent  upon,  the  experience 
given  the  child  by  the  home,  the  playground  and 
the  shop,  store,  farm  or  office.  The  industrial  and 
social  environment  which  surrounded  the  child  of 
the  last  quarter  of  last  century  was  educationally 
deficient  in  many  respects.  Psychology  and  physi- 
ology have  pointed  out  the  necessity  of  certain 
forms  of  training — hand-work,  eye-work,  leg-work, 
etc.  Industrial  and  psychological  needs  are  the 
two  cooperating  forces  which  broadened  the  scope 
of  education  during  this  period,  and  developed  the 
so-called  educational  "fads."  The  progressive  pro- 
fessional educator,  the  manufacturer  and  the  busi- 
ness man  joined  hands,  and  they  were  not  actively 
opposed  by  the  workingmen.  Manual  training  and 
domestic  science  were  first  introduced  into  the  high 
schools,  and  only  found  tardy  recognition  in  the 
grade  schools  where  their  psychological  value  is 
greater  and  their  industrial  value  less  than  in  the 
high  school.  When  we  remember  that  progress  in 
society,  like  the  motion  of  material  objects,  is  merely 
the  resultant  of  many  forces,  it  is  not  difficult  to 
account  for  this  phenomenon.  The  manufacturers 
and  business  interests  are  naturally  only  directly 
concerned  with  manual  training  from  an  industrial 
point  of  view,  and  their  interest  was  therefore  cen- 
tered on  high-school  manual  training  and  technical 
instruction  of  higher  grade.    The  interests  which 

42 


EDUCATIONAL    EPOCHS 

advocated  manual  training  from  the  scientific  of 
professional  standpoint  were  less  effective  if  meas- 
ured by  concrete  results.  Trade  education  has  not 
been  advocated  from  the  psychological  or  peda- 
gogical point  of  view,  and  has,  in  many  instances, 
been  actively  opposed  by  the  workingmen.  These 
facts  are  perhaps  sufficient  to  account  for  its 
absence  from  the  public-school  system. 

The  nation  seems  to  be  standing  to-day  on  the 
threshold  of  a  new  educational  epoch, — one  which 
the  future  historian  will  be  able  to  differentiate 
from  the  one  which  has  been  designated  as  the 
third.  The  fourth  period  promises  to  be  intensely 
democratic, — semi-socialistic.  At  the  outset  two 
phenomena  especially  attract  our  attention,  (i) 
The  unskilled  workers  are  for  the  first  time  exert- 
ing a  powerful  influence  in  the  councils  of  labor 
unions;  the  new  and  rapidly  developing  form  of 
labor  organization  is  the  industrial  union,  in  con- 
tradistinction to  the  older  trade  union.  (2)  Wo- 
men's organizations  or  clubs,  are  beginning  to 
exert  a  powerful  directive  influence  upon  social, 
political  and  educational  affairs.  Another  impor- 
tant factor  in  the  combination  of  forces  is  introduced 
by  the  entrance  of  women  of  the  middle  class  into 
industrial  and  professional  pursuits.  In  1900  about 
one  in  every  seven  adult  females  living  in  the  cities 
of  the  United  States  was  a  wage-earner.  Women 
are  no  longer  confined  to  the  narrow  round  of  home 
duties  as  they  were  in  earlier  generations.  Whether 
this  change  in  the  life  and  work  of  women  is  bene- 
ficial or  harmful  need  not  here  be  discussed;  the 

43 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

fact  confronts  us,  and  it  tends  to  modify  and 
farther  enlarge  the  sphere  of  the  modern  school 
system.  These  three  phenomena  are  the  visible 
results  of  the  action  of  forces  which  are,  in  no  small 
measure,  responsible  for  the  educational  progress 
of  the  last  few  years.  The  beginning  of  this  era  is 
marked  by  the  transfer  of  the  emphasis  from  the 
psychological  to  the  social  and  recreational  value  of 
education.  Sociological,  rather  than  psychological 
considerations  are  now  placed  in  the  foreground. 

In  this  brief  historical  survey  the  attempt  has 
been  made  to  point  out,  in  a  general  way,  the  rela- 
tion which  has  existed  between  educational  advance 
and  social  and  economic  progress  in  the  United 
States.^  The  massing  of  these  historical  data  fur- 
nishes the  background  for  a  more  detailed  con- 
sideration of  the  educational  methods  and  needs 
of  the  present  era.  The  science  of  education  has 
been,  and  is  to-day,  greatly  hampered  because  the 
real  forces  which  cause  and  guide  educational 
progress  have  not  been  seriously  and  patiently 
studied;  in  reality  these  forces  have,  as  a  rule,  been 
ignored  or  rejected  by  educators.  Until  the  inti- 
mate relation  between  education  and  industrial 
evolution  is  clearly  recognized,  the  newly  born 
science  of  pedagogy  or  education  can  never  become 
truly  scientific. 

*  For  a  more  detailed  study  of  the  first  and  second  periods, 
see  the  author's  monograph,  Economic  Influences  upon  Edu- 
cational Advance  in  the  United  States,  1820-18 50.  Bulletin 
of  the  University  of  Wisconsin,  1908. 


44 


CHAPTER   III 

THE  RELATION  BETWEEN  EDUCATIONAL 
ADVANCE   AND   INDUSTRIAL   PROGRESS 

Writers  and  students  who  have  turned  their  at- 
tention to  educational  problems  have  almost  without 
exception  given  adherence  to  what  may  be  called 
the  "great-man"  theory  of  educational  progress. 
They  have  maintained  the  thesis  that  educational 
advance  has  been  chiefly,  if  not  wholly,  due  to  the 
efforts  and  the  perseverance  of  certain  great  per- 
sonalities, who,  by  the  sheer  force  of  personal  ability 
and  merit,  have  pushed  their  particular  contribution 
upon  a  reluctant  public.  During  the  first  period  of 
great  educational  activity  in  the  United  States, 
according  to  this  theory,  our  educational  progress 
was  attributed  to  Horace  Mann,  Henry  Barnard, 
James  G.  Carter,  Samuel  Lewis  and  others.  With- 
out in  any  way  depreciating  the  value  of  the  labors 
of  these  able  and  earnest  men,  it  is  just  and  proper 
that  recognition  be  given  to  the  underlying  social 
and  economic  conditions  of  which  these  men  were, 
in  reality,  only  the  outward  and  visible  manifesta- 
tions, and  which  produced  the  situation  that  enabled 
them  to  carry  their  propaganda  to  a  more  or  less 
successful  issue ;  and  which,  indeed,  indicated  to 
them  the  need  of  such  work  and  filled  them  with  the 

45 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

zeal  and  ardor  necessary  to  carry  it  out  in  the  face 
of  determined  and  powerful  opposition.  Mann 
and  his  associates  exercised  a  "directive"  influence, 
as  Professor  Lester  F.  Ward  expresses  it ;  but  a 
further  search  must  be  made  for  the  "impelling" 
forces.  Only  when  the  student  comes  to  the  more 
recent  period  of  manual,  scientific  and  commercial 
training,  and  of  recreational  education,  does  he  find 
any  important  recognition  of  the  underlying  in- 
fluence of  social  and  industrial  changes.  Even  in 
this  period  little  has  been  done  except  to  point  out 
in  a  general  and  casual  way,  the  fact  that  industrial 
progress  and  the  growth  of  cities  have  led  to  many 
I  haphazard  additions  to  the  curriculum,  and  have 
been  the  real  cause  of  bitter  conflicts  between  the 
"reformers"  or  "fadists,"  and  the  "conservatives." 
The  reformer,  educational  or  otherwise,  is  a  prod- 
uct of  his  time ;  if  he  is  successful,  it  is  because  he 
has,  in  a  measure,  correctly  interpreted  the  hitherto 
vague  and  undefined  demands  of  the  classes  in  the 
community  which  are  rapidly  rising  in  influence  and 
Jimportance. 

The  many  striking  and  important  social  and  in- 
dustrial changes  which  have  occurred  during  the 
last  two  or  three  decades,  make  many  new  demands 
upon  our  educational  system.  In  recent  years  the 
broad  conception  of  education  as  a  lifelong  process 
has  been  generally  accepted.  It  is  no  longer  con- 
ceived to  be  solely  confined  within  the  walls  of 
school,  college  or  university.  Many  different  agen- 
cies— the  home,  the  playground,  the  press,  the  pul- 
pit,   the    lecture   platform,    the   library,    the    labor 

46 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

union,  the  store,  the  shop,  the  farm,  the  office,  the 
society, — all  supplement  and  complete  the  work  of 
the  school.  In  considering  the  duty  and  work  of 
our  public-school  system  at  the  present  time,  or  at 
any  other  period,  attention  should  be  paid  to  the 
functions  which  these  other  institutions  are  able  to 
perform  at  the  time  under  consideration.  The 
school  is  normally  a  time  and  labor-saving  device, 
as  well  as  an  institution  which  forms  the  character 
and  aids  in  the  development  of  the  individual,  and 
in  the  progress  of  society.  It  should  convey  to  the 
student  the  accumulated  experience  of  past  genera- 
tions, it  ought  to  show  the  significance  of  his  daily 
experience,  and  coordinate  the  latter  with  his  studies 
and  investigations;  it  ought  to  train  him  so  that 
he  can  and  will  wish  to  continue  his  education  by 
the  aid  of  these  other  secondary  educational  agen- 
cies; and  lastly,  but  not  least,  it  should  attempt  to 
supply  any  deficiencies  which  change  may  develop 
in  any  one  or  all  of  these  other  agencies.  The  real 
function  of  the  school  is  to  adjust  the  individual 
to  his  environment — physical,  industrial  and  social. 
In  the  study  of  educational  problems  at  the 
present  time,  two  important,  but  often  overlooked 
or  neglected,  facts  confront  the  investigator.  In 
the  first  place,  the  social  environment,  the  sum  total 
of  influences  which  bear  upon  the  life  of  the  in- 
dividual, has  been  increased  in  extent, — in  other 
words,  the  entire  world  has  been  drawn  closely 
into  touch.  People,  intelligence,  goods,  now  come 
from  and  go  to  the  most  distant  parts  of  the  globe 
quickly,  surely  and  regularly.     On  the  other  hand, 

47 


i 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

occupations  and  certain  characteristics  of  home  life 
have  changed  so  as  to  tend  to  produce  narrow  views 
of  life,  and  to  confine  the  vast  majority  of  indi- 
viduals within  narrow  grooves  of  action  and 
thought;  the  tendency  is  to  cause  the  individual  to 
live  in  "parenthesis,"  disconnected  from  the  great 
world  thought  and  action.  While  modern  com- 
munication and  transportation,  and  world  markets 
demand  a  broader  life  and  tend  to  produce  broad, 
liberal  views  of  society  and  of  the  world;  occupa- 
tions have  been  specialized  and  subdivided  until  the 
life  of  the  majority  of  individuals  is  cramped. 
Our  daily  work  and  home  environment,  whether 
rural  or  urban,  tend  to  contract  and  astigmatize 
our  view  at  the  very  period  when  democracy  and 
the  idea  of  a  community  spirit  should  thrive  and 
be    actually    transformed    into    a    reality.     This    is 

r  indeed  a  grim  paradox  of  modern  industrial  life. 
The  earlier  forms  of  industry  gave  the  worker  a 
relatively  broad  outlook;  division  of  labor  and 
specialization  of  industries  tend  to  narrow  this 
vision.  As  the  division  becomes  more  and  more 
minute,  the  production  of  goods  requires  the  co- 
operation of  a  constantly  increasing  number  of 
workers.  Each  one  forms  but  a  link  in  a  great 
industrial  chain,  and  consequently  sees  only  a 
minute  part  of  the  entire  operation  necessary  to 
make  the  completed  article.  Machine  production 
aims  at  making  a  uniform  and  interchangeable 
product.  The  workman  is  unfortunately  bound 
down  to  a  rigid  and  monotonous  routine;  he  be- 
comes in  time  almost  automatic  in  his  movements. 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

He  struggles  blindly  on,  working  and  producing, 
without  recognizing  the  end  in  view,  without  feel- 
ing that  he,  himself,  is  an  integral  and  necessary 
factor  in  the  formation  and  operation  of  a  great 
industrial  machine  or  organism. 

The  school  must  aim  to  demonstrate  the  social 
necessity  of  each  worker's  task,  and  to  give  a  clew 
to  the  great,  intricate  industrial  labyrinth.  The 
problem  of  the  relation  of  labor  to  capital  cannot 
be  solved  until  the  work  and  function  of  all  factors 
of  production  are  clearly  understood  by  a  majority 
of  the  people;  when  such  a  condition  obtains,  the 
question  of  the  proper  distribution  of  wealth  will  be 
greatly  simplified.  The  school  attempts  to  meet 
the  new  economic  conditions  by  enlarging  its  cur- 
riculum ;  it  now  aims  at  more  than  mere  mental 
training  and  discipline.  Manual  training,  nature 
study,  kindergartens,  athletics,  physical  training, 
commercial  trainmg,  agriculture,  domestic  science, 
cooking,  sewing,  drawing,  modeling,  painting  and 
music  are  now  incorporated  into  the  course  of 
study.  These  added  features  are  merely  tentative 
attempts  to  give  training  which  was  formerly  pro- 
vided outside  the  school,  but  which  cannot  be  so 
provided  under  present  conditions.  Much  of  this 
wofk  has  been  added  in  a  haphazard  manner,  in 
order  to  fill  a  vaguely  defined  need,  without  proper 
arrangement  or  agreement  with  the  older  portion 
of  the  school  curriculum.  These  additions,  the 
direct  result  in  many  instances  of  a  vigorous  popu- 
lar demand,  have  increased  the  importance  of  the 
school,  and  have  made  it  a  more  potent  factor  in 
4  49 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

the  industrial,  economic,  and  social  progress  of  this 
country.  Nevertheless,  after  this  enlargement  and 
enrichment  of  the  course,  there  still  remain  many 
gaps  in  our  educational  system  which  are  yet  to  be 
bridged  over. 

The  order  in  v»?hich  these  additions  have  taken 
place  is  fairly  well  defined.  As  scientific  discover- 
ies and  the  practical  applications  of  steam  and 
electricity  multiplied,  our  industrial  methods  un- 
derwent an  almost  complete  transformation,  A 
universal  need  for  scientific  and  technical  knowledge 
was  felt.  The  first  notable  change  from  the  time 
honored  curriculum  was  made  in  response  to  this 
requisition.  The  physical  sciences,  physics  and 
chemistry,  were  advanced  to  a  position  of  equal 
rank  with  mathematics  and  language.  Next  ap- 
peared a  demand  for  the  kindergarten,  manual 
training,  drawing  and  domestic  science.  This  was 
the  result  of  a  conscious  or  unconscious  recognition 
of  the  undesirability  of  a  wide  separation  of  hand 
work  from  head  work,  aided  by  the  call  of  manu- 
facturers for  young  men  possessing  trained  hands 
and  eyes.  The  need  of  such  training  was  not 
urgent  before  the  widespread  development  of  the 
factory  system.  Treading  on  the  heels  of  the 
manual-training  movements  came  physical  training, 
night  and  vacation  schools,  training  for  citizenship, 
nature  study,  school  gardening,  the  study  of  agri- 
cultural science,  and  the  special  school  for  the 
truant  and  the  "incorrigible."  Not  all  of  these 
additions  to  the  work  of  the  school  are  to  be  found 
in  any  one  system,  but  each  has  been  somewhere 

so 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY      "a^  \  3  J 


STAIC  Nt;?MAl  SCHOOL 
SANTA  lAPtHAnA,  CALIFUKNIA 


.j    recognized  as  a  desirable  feature  of  the  educational 
program.     In  general,  it  may  be  affirmed,  that  as  a 
_     people  pass  from  a  semi-primitive  agricultural  stage 
0     with  isolated,  nearly  independent  families,  to   the 
more  complex  industrial  life  involving  mutual  in- 
terdependence and  specialization  of  occupation,  the 
importance    of    the    education    gained    within    the 
school  increases  relatively  to  that  acquired  outside. 
What   is    the   significance    of   these   changes   to 
society?     It  seems  indisputable  that  the  importance 
of  the  school  relatively  to  that  of  the  home  in  the 
education  of  youth,  has  increased  and  is  still  in- 
creasing.    This    fact   grows    naturally   out   of  the 
changed   functions  and  environment  of  the  home 
of  the  present,  as  compared  with  that   of  imme- 
diately  preceding  generations.     Home  training   is 
^     highly  individualistic;  school  training  is  not.     The 
^     state  educates  the  young  in  order  to  advance  the 
welfare   of    society,    in   order    to    form    the    good 
•<    citizen, — the  efficient  producer  and  consumer.     The 
'i    desired  result  is  the  elevation  of  the  standard  of 
S     living  of  society, — a  social  benefit.     The  mass  can, 
i    however,   be   elevated    only  by   acting  upon   each 
"f    individual  composing  it.     The  school  becomes  so- 
^    ciety's   agent    for   the  promotion   of   its    collective 
:i^    welfare;  its   purpose  is  chiefly   directive.     As   so- 
ciety is  recruited  from  the  young,  it  is  necessary 
^  that  the  incoming  generations  be  worthy  successors 
^  of  the  outgoing.     The   attention   should   be   fixed 
•rr  upon   those   institutions   which   train  the   growing 
'"*  child,  and  not  so  much  upon  those  corrective  and 
>-  repressive   institutions   which   are  needed  because 
■5^       ■  51 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

the  early  training  and  direction  of  their  inmates 
were  not  what  they  should  have  been.  Too  much 
money  is  spent  upon  the  diseased  tree,  but  not 
enough  on  the  growing  twig.  The  functions  of 
the  school  should  include  the  intellectual,  physical, 
industrial  and  moral  training  of  the  young,  and  of 
the  older  persons  as  well;  the  greater  the  efficiency 
and  effectiveness  of  the  school,  the  less  the  need  for 
corrective  and  repressive  institutions. 

The  cure  for  many  industrial  and  social  ills  is  to 
be  found  in  the  proper  use  of  increased  leisure 
which  improved  industrial  methods  makes  possible, 
and  which  the  modern  ideal  of  democracy  proclaims 
to  be  the  birthright  of  each  and  all.  Leisure  makes 
possible  study,  social  intercourse  and  the  expansion 
of  the  life  of  the  individual  to  the  measure  which 
the  modern  world  community  spirit  demands. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  last  century  the  United 
States  was  a  weak  nation  possessing  an  unknown 
immensity  of  undeveloped  resources.  In  a  century 
it  grew  to  be  one  of  the  richest  and  most  powerful 
nations  of  the  earth, — an  acknowledged  great 
power.  Development  of  resources  was  the  demand 
and  the  necessity  of  the  period.  Exploitation  of 
natural  treasures  and  constant  expansion  was  the 
program  of  the  century.  Resourceful,  self-reliant, 
and  individualistic  men  who  were  willing  and  able 
to  devote  untiring  energy  to  the  task  of  building  up 
the  material  strength  and  resources  of  the  nation, 
wCiC  needed,  and  became  the  familiar,  successful 
and  progressive  type  of  American  manhood.  The 
fundamental,   all-absorbing  economic  question  was 

52 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

production  which  was  carried  on  chiefly  through 
the  exploitation  of  natural  resources.  The  rough  , 
and  crude  form  of  frontier  life  reacted  upon  the 
entire  people,  and  left  an  imprint  which  many  gen- 
erations will  not  entirely  eradicate.  As  long  as 
the  frontier  remained  there  was  continual  contact 
with  the  new  and  primitive.  This  type  of  civiliza- 
tion tended  to  continue  and  to  perpetuate  itself  long 
after  the  conditions  which  caused  it  had  passed 
into  history.  The  frontier  type  of  society  is 
highly  individualistic;  it  resents  the  interference  of 
organized  society  in  any  form.  In  such  a  com- 
munity might  often  spells  right.  It  places  little  or 
no  limitation  upon  the  use  or  abuse  of  property. 
The  right  of  the  individual  completely  overtowers 
the  right  of  society. 

After  the  disappearance  of  the  frontier  a  dif- 
ferent set  of  conditions  confronts  the  people  of  the 
United  States.  Widely  separated  farming  com- 
munities or  sparsely  settled  mining  districts,  and 
the  presence  of  immense  tracts  of  practically  free 
land,  demand  one  system  of  ethics,  one  code  of 
human  relations,  and  one  kind  of  educational  prin- 
ciples and  precepts;  while  densely  populated  cities, 
the  scarcity  of  free  land,  and  increased  mutual 
interdependence  make  imperative  a  new  scheme  of 
social  relations.  The  disappearance  of  the  frontier 
induces  a  weakening  of  the  individualistic  and  a 
strengthening  of  the  social  qualities  of  the  American 
people.  Sociological,  as  well  as  psychological, 
principles  begin  gradually  and  timidly  to  creep  into 
the  educational  world.     Society  must  adjust  itself 

S3 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

to  a  more  crowded  environment;  and  the  problem 
is  to  make  this  adjustment  along  the  lines  of  least 
resistance.  New  social,  industrial,  agricultural, 
commercial,  educational,  ethical  and  legal  forms 
now  become  necessary.  What  is  desirable  and 
even  highly  commendable  in  a  new,  fertile,  unde- 
veloped, and  expanding  country  may  become  a 
positive  menace  and  hindrance  in  an  older,  better 
developed,  and  more  densely  populated  nation. 
New  aims  and  new  ideals  are  requisite  to  this  ad- 
justment from  the  old  to  the  new.  Education  now 
assumes  a  position  of  greater  importance  than  it 
held  in  former  generations.  Changed  environment, 
crowded  cities,  more  intensive  and  more  scientific 
agriculture,  quicker  and  more  regular  methods  of 
transportation  and  communication  are  producing 
effects  which  are  plainly  noticeable  in  the  life, 
thought  and  action  of  the  entire  nation.  It  is, 
however,  extremely  difficult  for  a  people  schooled 
for  generations  in  the  university  of  self-reliance 
and  of  individual  liberty  to  graciously  accept  the 
restrictions  and  modifications  which  this  new  era 
makes  necessary ;  but  such  acceptance  is  inevitable. 
If  education  lags  behind,  rather  than  precedes,  this 
changing  sentiment,  if  it  is  merely  passively  carried 
along  with  the  stream,  instead  of  actively  aiding  in 
controlling  its  progress  and  direction,  it  fails  utterly 
to  effectively  perform  one  of  its  most  important 
duties — that  of  minimizing  the  friction  of  readjust- 
ment to  a  new  environment  and  a  new  set  of  social 
and  industrial  conditions.     This  need  of  adjustment 

54 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

should  be  recognized  by  educators,  and  intelligently 
dealt  with. 

The  men  of  the  present  are  not  Robinson  Crusoes, 
they  live  in  a  busy  world  peopled  with  millions  of 
other  similar  fellow  creatures.  An  individual  is 
what  he  is  because  of  the  existence  and  influence 
of  other  men ;  he  is  distinctly  a  social  product. 
Development  of  the  individual  is  the  resultant  of 
individualistic  and  of  social  demands ;  but  the  latter 
are  now  beginning  to  take  precedence  over  the 
former.  Purely  psychological  and  individualistic 
needs  and  desires  must  more  and  more  be  modified 
by  those  of  a  sociological  character.  Society  is  a 
complex  and  delicate  organism  or  piece  of  mechan- 
ism; the  wishes  and  ambitions  of  the  individual 
must,  in  an  increasing  measure,  be  subordinated  to 
and  dovetailed  into  the  needs  of  society  considered 
as  a  whole. 

The  disappearance  of  the  frontier  leads  to  the 
gradual  elevation  of  the  moral  tone  of  the  people. 
It  is  an  important  factor  in  assigning  greater  im- 
portance to  questions  of  distribution  and  consump- 
tion. Business  and  political  ideals  are  higher 
to-day  than  formerly.  Many  political  methods 
which  were  in  vogue  as  late  as  1896,  are  not  con- 
sidered to  be  in  good  form  to-day.  The  doctrine 
that  property  is  a  social  trust  is  gaining  ground  as 
it  could  not  have  done  twenty  or  forty  years  ago. 
We  are  examining  closely  the  methods  employed 
in  wealth  production.  The  monopolist  and  the  men 
of  great  wealth  are  now  put  on  the  defensive. 
Each  must  justify  the  social  utility  of  his  industrial 

55 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

power,  or  of  his  amassed  fortune.  Race  solidarity 
and  the  brotherhood  of  men  are  now  shibboleths. 
This  spirit  of  brotherhood  is  first  manifested  be- 
tween members  of  the  same  trade  or  society — 
comparatively  small  groups ;  but  gradually  it  en- 
larges its  scope  and  becomes  more  inclusive.  To- 
day the  laboring  man  is  found  preaching  the 
solidarity  and  mutual  interest  of  all  workers  in  the 
United  States — skilled  and  unskilled  alike.  A  great 
strike  is  conducted  upon  a  clear  recognition  of  this 
principle,  one  which  could  hardly  have  arisen  into 
consciousness  if  a  great  mass  of  fertile  and  easily 
accessible  land  was  still  our  national  heritage. 
Such  a  change  as  this  calls  insistently  for  new  ideals 
in  education. 

America  is  an  enormous  assimilative  cauldron. 
Here  are  gathered  nearly  all  the  tribes  and  peoples 
of  the  earth  in  one  great  heterogeneous  mass ;  and 
the  public-school  system  is  the  official  assimilator. 
It  deals  with  the  young  and  plastic.  Excepting 
those  who  attend  private  and  parochial  schools,  our 
laws  bring  all  the  children  of  the  entire  country 
under  the  influence  of  the  public-school  system. 
The  immigrant  comes  to  us  from  an  entirely  differ- 
ent environment;  he  has  developed  under  different 
influences.  His  home  life  is  not  the  same  as  ours; 
his  child  possesses  other  concepts,  traits  and  ideals 
than  those  of  the  American  boy  or  girl.  The  pro- 
cess of  assimilation  usually  means  the  molding  of 
this  people  in  conformity  to  the  so-called  Anglo- 
Saxon  cast.  It  is  forgotten  that  these  people  have 
many  characteristics  and  traits  which  might  well  be 

S6 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

grafted  into  our  civilization  and  thus  perpetuated. 
Miss  Jane  Addams  has  done  much  to  emphasize 
this  important  fact.  She  points  out  that  it  is  char- 
acteristic American  "complacency"  to  utterly  ignore 
the  past  experience  of  the  immigrant  who  comes  to 
our  shores.  Ernest  Crosby  makes  the  indictment 
more  sweeping  and  severe.  "And  not  content  with 
stifling  the  originality  of  the  immigrant,  we  must 
needs  carry  our  missionary  zeal  for  uniformity  to 
foreign  lands  in  the  hope  of  destroying  all  individ- 
uality. In  Anglo-Saxonizing  India  and  Japan  we 
are  crushing  out  the  most  wonderful  of  arts  beyond 
a  possibility  of  resurrection.  We  are  the  Goths 
and  Vandals  of  the  day.  We  are  the  Tartars  and 
the  Turks.  And  the  countries  which  we  overrun 
have  each  its  own  priceless  heritage  of  art  and 
legend  which  we  ruthlessly  stamp  underfoot." 
Some  attempt  certainly  should  be  made  to  preserve 
and  continue  the  desirable  traits  and  gifts  of  the 
different  alien  people  who  crowd  to  our  shores, 
and  to  assimilate  these  traits  into  the  sum  total  of 
our  national  characteristics.  Few  educators  have 
as  yet  seen  the  possibilities  and  the  desirability  of 
progress  in  this  direction. 

It  should  be  noticed  that  not  until  after  our 
frontier  was  practically  a  thing  of  historical  sig- 
nificance only,  did  the  immigration  from  Southern 
Europe  begin.  These  people  lack  individual  initia- 
tive ;  they  live  in  little  communities.  With  the  rise 
of  modern  industrialism  and  of  urban  life,  our 
civilization  took  on  aspects  which  were  attractive 
to  the  more  docile  and  less  individualistic  emigrant 

57 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

of  many  sections  of  Europe.  The  traits  of  these 
people  are  more  nearly  consonant  with  the  life  of 
to-day  than  that  of  the  early  individualistic  Anglo- 
Saxon  frontiersman.  The  assimilation  of  these 
races  and  of  their  culture  may  modify  our  civiliza- 
tion and  traits  in  a  very  desirable  manner.  A 
Greek  immigrant,  in  a  letter  recently  published, 
clearly  states  the  proposition.  "In  this  country 
there  is  a  great  movement  against  the  foreigners 
and  especially  those  of  Latin,  Slavic  and  Jewish 
origin.  The  Latin  and  Jew  (altruist  and  senti- 
mentalist) will  give  in  this  country  some  of  their 
qualities  that  the  northern  people  don't  have.  The 
Americans  (egoists  and  individualists)  need  some 
of  our  blood  to  change  their  character  in  the  next 
generation."  There  is,  however,  another  side  to 
this  question  which  will  be  touched  upon  later. 

The  rapid  growth  of  cities  has  been  a  marked 
feature  of  recent  growth  and  development.  The 
city  of  to-day  is  the  result  of  a  rapid  and  unhealthy 
growth.  People  have  been  rudely  drawn  from  a 
rural  environment  and  quickly  sucked  into  these 
great  uneasy  vortices  of  industry  and  trade.  The 
ideals,  customs,  and  habits  of  the  rural  community 
have  gone  with  them  to  this  new  environment,  and 
still  cling  with  great  tenacity.  Only  in  recent  years 
have  the  city  dwellers  awakened  to  the  fact  that 
they  are  really  dwelling  in  an  environment  which 
calls  for  new,  non-rural  rules  of  action  and  of  asso- 
ciation. The  nature  of  the  city  itself  has  been 
modified.  It  is  larger,  more  crowded,  more  de- 
pendent upon  arteries  of  trade  and  transportation, 

58 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

and  upon  the  supplies  furnished  from  the  outside. 
The  race  must  adapt  itself  to  urban  conditions  as 
they  exist  to-day ;  we  must  learn  to  live  and  to 
thrive  in  densely  populated  centers.  If  the  United 
States  is  to  continue  on  its  present  course  of  ad- 
vancement and  progress,  the  city  must  be  made 
clean,  healthy,  moral,  and  it  must  be  well  governed. 
The  majority  of  the  successful  business  and  profes- 
sional men  of  to-day  were  born  in  rural  districts. 
In  the  past  the  country  has  furnished  the  bone  and 
sinew  of  the  city,  and,  as  a  necessary  consequence, 
it  has  been  drained  of  many  of  its  best  and  most  pro- 
gressive citizens.  The  city  cannot  indefinitely  con- 
tinue its  parasitic  existence.  Already  one  third  of 
our  population  are  urban  dwellers.  A  much  larger 
percentage  of  our  successful  and  progressive  men 
and  women  must  in  the  future  be  drawn  from  the 
city-born  and  city-bred  population;  hence,  the 
urgent  need  of  improved  conditions  in  our  cities. 

The  modern  city  is  a  mere  industrial  establish- 
ment; but  it  must  be  made  a  cluster  of  homes. 
Healthy  and  wholesome  home  surroundings  can 
only  be  obtained  through  education  as  to  the  sani- 
tary and  esthetic  requirements  of  urban  communi- 
ties ;  and  these  efforts  must  begin  with  the  child. 
The  cities  have  been  "great  sores  upon  the  body 
politic,"  because  they  have  experienced  such  a  rapid 
development  that  society  has  been  unable  to  modify 
itself  rapidly  and  sufficiently  to  meet  the  require- 
ments of  the  situation.  A  twofold  weakness  of 
our  educational  system  is  revealed  at  this  point. 
The  curriculum  and  the  methods  of  the  city  school 

59 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

have  not  been  sufficiently  modified  to  meet  the  re- 
quirements of  children,  living  in  a  crowded  city, 
with  little  opportunity  for  constructive  work  or 
healthful  recreation.  Some  progress  has  been 
made  in  this  direction  as  will  be  pointed  out  later, 
but  there  is  still  great  need  for  further  improve- 
ment. On  the  other  hand  the  rural  school  has 
assisted  in  augmenting  the  growth  of  the  cities  and 
in  encouraging  the  drift  away  from  the  farm.  Its 
curriculum  has  absolutely  ignored,  with  a  few  very 
recent  exceptions,  the  fact  that  the  farm  presents 
problems  which  require  education  and  training  to 
solve.  "Every  book  they  [the  country  children] 
study  leads  to  the  city ;  every  ambition  they  receive 
inspires  them  to  run  away  from  the  country;  the 
things  they  read  about  are  city  things ;  the  greatness 
they  dream  about  is  city  greatness."  The  prob- 
lems connected  with  the  city,  those  relating  to  labor, 
and  all  our  great  industrial  and  social  questions, 
are  at  the  root  questions  of  education. 

However,  after  the  faults  of  the  city  have  been 
examined  and  laid  bare,  it  is  but  just  to  recall  that 
the  cities  have  ever  stood  in  a  forefront  of  the 
educational  advance  and  in  the  development  of 
labor  organizations.  Our  free  tax-supported  schools, 
for  example,  originated  in  the  cities.  A  striking 
illustration  of  the  position  of  the  cities  is  found  in 
the  result  of  the  referendum  of  1850,  which  estab- 
lished free  schools  throughout  the  state  of  New 
York.  The  vote  revealed  a  sharp  division  of  urban 
against  rural  counties,  and  the  former  stood  for 
progress     and    for    better    educational     facilities. 

60 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

Without  entering  exhaustively  into  an  analysis  of 
the  situation,  jfive  reasons  may  be  assigned  for 
this  phenomenon  which  is  by  no  means  confined  to 
the  Empire  State :  ( i )  A  large  percentage  of  our 
city  population  are  industrial  workers  who  are 
small  or  non-taxpayers.  (2)  In  the  large  cities 
are  found  great  masses  of  accumulated  wealth 
which  can  be  taxed.  (3)  Here  the  home  first  lost 
its  industrial  character  and  its  surrounding  play- 
ground, and  as  a  result  much  of  its  educational 
possibilities.  (4)  People  are  crowded  closely  to- 
gether in  cities,  evils  and  needs  are  more  in  evidence 
than  in  rural  districts.  Also,  the  opportunities  for 
agitation  and  propaganda  are  more  numerous.  (5) 
Pauperism  and  juvenile  crime  are  more  prevalent 
and  disturbing  in  cities  than  in  the  country. 

Industrial  progress  has  brought  about  the  sepa- 
ration of  the  workers  into  distinct,  well-defined 
classes;  particularly  marked  is  the  division  between 
the  manual  workers  and  the  brain  workers  or  the 
managers  of  the  business.  Professor  Veblen  re- 
marks that  the  progress  of  industry  has  relieved 
one  class  of  workers  "of  the  cares  of  business" ; 
and  they  "have  with  increasing  specialization  given 
their  attention  to  the  mechanical  processes  involved 
in  the  production  for  the  market."  The  remarkable 
increase  of  the  indirect  method  of  labor  is  a  factor 
in  the  modern  industrial  problem.  The  workers 
no  longer  produce  directly  to  satisfy  their  own 
wants;  each  produces  for  others,  while  all  furnish 
something  for  each  individual.  It  is  a  round- 
about process ;  the  connection  between  effort  and 
61 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

satisfaction  is  hidden.  The  direct  reaction  between 
effort  and  satisfaction  has  been  superseded  by  a 
very  complex  social  and  industrial  chain  of  actions 
and  reactions.  The  worker  often  becomes  a  drudge, 
a  drone,  an  unthinking  piece  of  mechanism,  par- 
tially because  he  does  not  recognize  or  feel  that  his 
work  has  any  social  significance,  because  there  is 
little  apparent  causal  relations  between  effort  and 
wages.     Industry  has  been  "depersonalized." 

Modern  specialization  of  industry,  diversification 
of  demands,   and   increase   in  the   variety  of   con- 
sumption have  tended  to  divide  the  population  into 
a  large  number  of  classes  and  interests.     Progress 
has  always  resulted  from  class  struggles,  the  clash 
of  interests ;  but  to-day  the  form  of  this  contest  has 
become    complex.     There    are    the    familiar   tradi- 
.       tional    classes, — landowners,    manufacturers,    mer- 
I     J        chants,  professional  men,   and  laborers;  but  each 
\tA^  one  of  these  classes  is  now  split  into  sub-groups  on 

the  one  hand  while,  on  the  other,  many  individuals 
'*^  may  be  placed  in  two  or  more  classes  or  sub-classes. 
-r^'f^^-^^-^  Nevertheless  many  difficulties  and  obstructions  now 
S-^iJb,       face  the  workman  who  aspires  to  become  an  em- 
fj"  u         ployer,  who  struggles  to  rise  out  of  his  class.     John 
'  '"t'' '     Mitchell  believes  that  the  workers  are,  as  a  rule, 
6g^.^^      acting  on  the  principal  that  they  cannot  rise  out 
of  that  class.     For  the  vast  majority  it  is  once  a 
wage-earner,  always  a  wage-earner.     The  amount 
of  capital  now  required  to  set  up  in  nearly  every 
business  is  large.     Even  the  farmer  who  runs  in 
debt  for  his  farm,  finds  it  almost  impossible,   in 
many    sections    of   this    country,    to    pay    off    the 
63 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

mortgage  from  the  profits  of  the  farm.  The  amount 
of  money  required  to  enter  the  iron  and  steel  busi- 
ness is  measured  by  hundreds  of  thousands  or  mil- 
lions of  dollars.  Consolidation  of  business  interests 
reduces  the  numbers  of  managers  and  superintend- 
ents. The  great  industrial  concerns  and  the  rail- 
roads are  becoming  large  civil  service  systems.  A 
man  must  enter  their  employ  in  his  youth,  at  the 
bottom,  remain  with  the  company  year  after  year, 
gradually  working  into  better  paid  and  more  re- 
sponsible positions.  But  he  always  remains  an 
employee.  The  young  man  can  no  longer  work 
hard  for  a  few  years,  save  a  few  hundreds  or 
thousands  of  dollars,  and  then  set  up  in  business 
as  an  employer  of  others,  many  of  whom  will  fol- 
low in  his  footsteps  within  a  few  years.  The 
person  who  now  accumulates  a  small  amount  of 
property  is  obliged  to  turn  the  management  of  it 
over  to  others.  Investments  in  stocks  and  bonds, 
deposits  in  savings  banks,  insurance,  and  like  modes 
of  investing  property  take  the  place  of  investment 
in  landed  property  or  in  a  business  managed  by  the 
property  owner.  Management  by  proxy  becomes 
the  rule,  not  the  exception.  The  corporate  form 
of  business  requires  the  concentration  of  large 
amounts  of  property  under  the  control  of  a  chosen 
few.  The  savings  bank,  for  example,  is  merely  a 
collective  form  of  investing  in  which  the  invest- 
ments are  made  by  the  banker  rather  than  by  the 
hundreds  of  small  investors  themselves.  The  dis- 
cipline that  comes  from  the  care  and  management 

63 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

of  property  is  lost  on  the  great  multitude  of  workers 
of  to-day. 

Also,  coincident  with  this  phenomenon  is  the 
above-mentioned  change  in  the  character  of  the 
multitudes  of  immigrants  who  are  flocking  to  our 
shores.  In  the  report  of  the  Commissioner-Gen- 
eral of  Immigration,  for  1904,  an  official  of  the 
bureau  who  has  been  conducting  extensive  investi- 
gations in  Europe,  writes  from  there  as  follows: 
"The  average  immigrant  of  to-day  is  sadly  lacking 
in  that  courage,  intelligence,  and  initiative  which 
characterized  the  European  people  who  settled  in 
the  Western  States  during  the  eighties."  The  per- 
sonal initiative,  adaptability,  and  self-reliance  of 
the  American  has  ever  been  the  pride  of  the  nation ; 
but  the  environment,  business  methods,  and  oppor- 
tunities which  aided  in  the  production  of  these 
characteristics  are  undergoing  modification.  In- 
dustry and  commerce  offer  opportunity  to  only  a 
few,  for  the  development  of  these  valuable  traits; 
and  immigration  brings  us  a  class  of  people  who 
are  also  sadly  deficient  in  these  qualities. 

"The  machine  process  is  a  severe  and  insistent 
disciplinarian  in  point  of  intelligence.  It  requires 
close  and  unremitting  thought,  but  it  is  thought 
which  runs  in  standard  terms  of  quantitative  pre- 
cision. Broadly,  other  intelligence  on  the  part  of 
the  workman  is  useless,  or  it  is  even  worse  than 
useless."^  Unfortunately  under  present  conditions, 
the  above  quotation  states  what  is  true  in  many 
cases  of  subdivided  labor.     Extreme  subdivision  of 

*  Veblen,  Theory  of  Business  Enterprise,  p.  308. 
64 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

labor  has  reduced  the  unskilled  worker  to  the  level 
of  an  automatic  piece  of  machinery.  Brains,  ideals, 
everything  which  go  to  make  up  the  real  human 
being  and  to  differentiate  him  from  the  automatic 
machine  are  at  a  discount.  The  man  becomes  a 
"hand."  The  internal  organization  is  now  placed 
on  a  scientific,  calculated  basis.  Time  cards  and 
exact  methods  of  determining  the  cost  of  labor  and 
material  are  now  essential  to  every  well-regulated 
business.  Every  step  from  the  first  displacement 
of  the  raw  material  until  the  finished  product  is  in 
the  hands  of  the  consumer  is  carefully  calculated. 

The  chief  motive  for  subdivision  of  labor  is  given 
by  the  opportunity  to  hire  unskilled,  low-standard- 
of-living  workers  at  an  extremely  low  wage. 
"Thus  division  of  labor  is,  in  the  last  analysis, 
nothing  but  one  of  those  processes  of  adaptation 
that  play  so  great  a  part  in  the  evolutionary  history 
of  the  whole  inhabited  world :  adaptation  of  the 
tasks  of  labor  to  the  variety  of  human  powers, 
adaptation  of  individuals  to  the  tasks  to  be  per- 
formed, continued  differentiation  of  the  one  and  of 
the  other."^  But,  if  this  differentiation  is  carried 
so  far  as  to  tie  the  individuals  down  to  such  a  nar- 
row routine  as  to  prevent  their  rising  in  the  scale 
of  life,  it  is  a  bar  to  human  progress.  The  immi- 
grant  is  one  of  the  causes  of  subdivision  of  labor. 
Where  labor  unions  are  strong  enough  to  establish 
a  minimum  wage,  some  modifications  may  be  looked 
for ;  but  the  question  which  society  must  face  is : 
Can  society  afford  to  allow  certain  of  its  members 

*  Bucher,  Industrial  Evolution,  p.  299. 
5  65 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

to  be  reduced  to  the  condition  of  human  automa- 
tons? If  it  is  held  that  certain  classes  in  the 
community  cannot  be  improved  or  raised  to  a 
higher  level,  then  indeeJ  the  caste  form  of  society 
is  treading  close  upon  the  heels  of  the  American 
people. 

Division  of  labor,  perhaps  even  minute  sub- 
division of  labor,  may  be  considered  to  be  a  per- 
manent factor  in  industry.  Modern  industry  is 
more  productive,  many  times  more  productive  per 
Vi^orker,  than  the  older,  more  simple  forms;  and  as 
a  result  a  shorter  working  day  is  allowed  the 
worker.  This  grinding,  unvarying,  monotonous, 
joyless  sort  of  working  period  should  be  balanced 
by  broader  social  life,  by  better,  more  elevating  use 
of  leisure  time.  In  short,  as  one's  work  becomes 
exact  and  narrowing,  one's  leisure  time  should 
bring  variety  and  breadth  of  experience.  The  suf- 
frage has  been  extended  to  practically  all  the  male 
population  over  twenty-one  years  of  age;  but  in 
order  to  exercise  the  franchise  intelligently,  as  it  was 
recognized  in  the  days  of  Plato  and  Aristotle,  the 
citizen  must  have  leisure  time  to  study  and  discuss 
the  social  and  political  problems  of  the  day.  If 
this  leisure  time  is  not  properly  or  wisely  utilized, 
the  "boss"  and  the  "machine"  flourish.  The  great 
multiplicity  of  clashing  interests  also  offers  oppor- 
tunity for  the  shrewd  and  unscrupulous  politician 
to  play  interest  against  interest,  and  to  win  political 
control  and  personal  gain  through  careful  manipu- 
lation.    In  any  industrial  democracy  the  problem 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

of  the  utilization  of  leisure  becomes  one  of  the  im- 
portant and  vital  problems. 

Looking  again  at  education  from  a  purely  eco- 
nomic point  of  view,  aside  from  ethical  considera- 
tions, the  aim,  let  it  be  repeated,  should  be  to 
develop  not  only  more  efficient  producers,  but  also 
more  efficient  consumers.  All  men  must  be  con- 
sidered from  the  side  of  consumption  as  well  as  of 
production.  The  end  and  aim  of  normal  economic 
activity  is  consumption  of  economic  goods.  Other 
things  being  equal,  consumption  should  be  directed 
toward  those  articles  which  the  country  is  best 
adapted  to  produce ;  it  should  also  be  directed  away 
ffom  the  excessive  demand  for  the  raw  and  crude 
economic  goods,  toward  a  greater  variety  in  quan- 
tity and  quality  of  demands.  As  Clark  has  shown, 
the  tendency  of  dynamic  economics,  as  seen  from 
the  purely  economic  point  of  view,  is  toward  variety 
in  consumption  and  specialization  in  production. 
But  after  a  certain  point  is  passed  specialization  in 
production  tends  to  prevent  greater  variety  in  con- 
sumption. These  economic  considerations,  as  well 
as  those  of  an  ethical  or  social  nature,  set  bounds 
beyond  which  specialization  ought  not  to  pass. 
This  limit  is  not  fixed  and  invariable.  For  exam- 
ple, the  man  who  has  an  avocation,  who  utilizes  his 
leisure  in  such  a  way  as  to  broaden  his  view  of  life, 
so  as  to  exercise  many  different  sets  of  muscles  and 
brain  cells,  may  specialize  his  work  much  more 
minutely  without  individual  detriment  or  economic 
and  social  loss,  than  the  man  who  talks  shop,  or 
does  nothing  to  diversify  his  tastes  or  to  open  up 

67 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

new  lines  of  thought  and  action  during  his  leisure 
hours.  In  the  terms  employed  by  the  economist, 
the  ideal  point  of  equilibrium  is  where  the  descend- 
ing curve  of  the  social  value  of  the  products  due  to 
additional  subdivision  is  met  by  the  ascending  curve 
of  disutility  due  to  long-continued  and  narrow 
specialization  on  the  part  of  the  individual  members 
of  society.  Other  things  remaining  the  same,  the 
additional  products  which  come  into  being  through 
increasing  subdivision,  gradually  diminish  in  value 
as  increment  after  increment  is  added,  according  to 
the  well-known  law  of  diminishing  utility;  and  on 
the  contrary  the  detriment  to  society  as  a  whole 
increases  as  individuals  are  forced  into  narrower 
and  narrower  rounds  of  duty. 

Ethical  considerations  lead  directly  and  unequivo- 
cally to  the  conviction  that  men  must  not  be  treated 
as  machines,  that  the  true  end  and  aim  of  industry 
is  the  production  of  men,  not  the  multiplication  of 
profits.  True  long-run  economic  aims  coincide 
with  ethical  ideals.  As  Walt  Whitman  has  taught 
us :  "Produce  great  men,  the  rest  follows."  Primi- 
tive industry  was  always  a  means  to  an  end  which 
was  plainly  seen ;  it  was  never  an  end  in  itself.  It 
has  remained  for  modern  times  to  heap  up  com- 
plexity, confusion,  and  cross-purposes  until  the 
fundamentals  have  been  hidden  from  view.  When 
the  methods  of  modern  complex  industry  come  into 
collision  with  the  true  economic  and  ethical  de- 
mands of  society,  the  former  must  be  modified.  It 
is  one  of  the  functions  of  education  to  harmonize 
the  demands  of  these  two   apparently  conflicting 

68 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

and  opposing  forces.  It  should  so  train  the  mem- 
bers of  society  as  to  allow  the  greatest  possible 
advantage  to  be  taken  of  efficient  productive 
methods  consistent  with  the  welfare  and  best  de- 
velopment of  the  individual  members  of  society  of 
all  classes  and  conditions. 

Both  the  internal  and  external  organization  of 
industry  now  tend  to  remove  variety,  irregularity, 
risk,  chance,  and  speculation.  The  business  of  the 
future  calls  for  the  manager  and  the  administrator 
rather  than  the  speculator  or  the  promotor,  for  the 
steady,  routinized,  narrowly  specialized  worker 
rather  than  all-round  men  so  familiar  in  the  early 
industrial  history  of  the  United  States.  The  traits 
of  the  pioneer,  the  backwoodsman,  and  the  hunter, 
those  traits  due  to  varied  and  changing  experiences 
of  the  early  settler,  continue,  however,  and  are 
transmitted  from  generation  to  generation  long 
after  the  stimuli  which  produced  them  has  ceased 
to  act  and  has  been  overwhelmed  by  the  rising  tide 
of  civilization.  If  modern  life  offers  inadequate 
opportunity  in  the  ordinary  course  of  daily  life  for 
the  expression  of  these  inherited  impulses,  if  they 
are  inhibited  from  all  beneficial  or  desirable  ex- 
pression, they  will  find  expression  in  abnormal  or 
undesirable  ways.  Gambling,  sport  of  all  kinds, 
drinking,  carousing,  are  some  of  the  many  forms 
in  which  these  inhibited  traits  find  a  vent.  The 
assimilation  of  the  recent  immigration  will  dilute 
and  diminish  the  strength  of  these  characteristics; 
but  they  should  not  be  smothered  and  cast  aside, 

69 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

they  should  be  utiHzed  and  turned  into  new  and 
modem  channels  of  activity. 

Mr.  John  A.  Hobson  in  a  recent  article  touches 
upon  this  point.  "The  factory  employee,  the  shop 
assistant,  the  office  clerk,  the  most  typical  member 
of  modern  industrial  society,  finds  an  oppressive 
burden  of  uninteresting  order,  of  mechanism,  in 
their  working  day.  Their  work  affords  no  con- 
siderable scope  for  spontaneity,  self-expression  and 
the  interest,  achievement  and  surprise  which  are 
ordinary  human  qualities.  It  is  easily  admitted 
that  an  absolutely  ordered  (however  well  ordered) 
human  life  would  be  vacant  of  interest  and  intol- 
erable; in  other  words  it  is  a  prime  condition  of 
humanity  that  the  unexpected  in  the  form  of  hap- 
pening and  achievement  should  be  represented  in 
every  life.  Art  in  its  widest  sense,  as  interested 
effort  of  production,  and  play  as  interested  but 
unproductive  effort,  are  essential."^  If  modern 
industrial  and  commercial  life  is  being  placed  upon 
a  stable,  sure,  scientific,  calculable  basis,  if  chance 
and  luck  are  being  replaced  by  skill  and  efficiency, 
if  routine  and  dead  uniformity  are  replacing  all- 
round  effort  and  variety,  if  the  home  environment 
is  becoming  more  monotonous  and  artificial,  other 
social  institutions  must  furnish  pleasurable  change 
and  variety.  If  elevating  institutions  such  as  the 
school  or  the  church  do  not  cope  satisfactorily  with 
the  situation,  other  much  less  desirable  ones  will, 
and  the  spirit  of  gambling,  of  riotous  living,  of 
carousal,  of  living  for  the  sake  of  sport,  will  enter 

^International  Journal  of  Ethics,  January,   1903. 
70 


EDUCATION    AND    INDUSTRY 

society  and  take  a  firm  hold.  Old  instincts  are  not 
easily  eradicated;  education  must  never  overlook 
them.  The  recent  additions  and  contemplated  ad- 
ditions to  our  educational  system  are  the  concrete 
results  of  some  of  the  attempts  which  have  been 
made  to  cope  with  the  question  in  a  more  or  less 
intelligent  manner. 

The  entrance  of  the  United  States  and  other 
important  industrial  nations  upon  a  policy  of  com- 
mercial expansion,  the  growth  of  imperialism,  and 
the  prevalence  of  the  desire  to  exploit  the  less  in- 
dustrially progressive  nations,  mark  the  beginning 
of  a  new  epoch  in  our  national  life.  Specialization 
of  industry  and  subdivision  of  labor  now  assume 
new  aspects.  Capital  becomes  international,  while 
labor  still  remains  upon  a  national  basis.  Mr. 
Hobson  and  others  have  pointed  out  that  the  back- 
ward nations  will  now  assume  the  place  hitherto 
occupied  by  the  great  mass  of  the  unskilled  in  the 
home  country.  Humanitarian  and  democratic 
tendencies  are  in  danger  of  receiving  a  check. 
Capital  in  a  new,  rapidly  developing  country  finds 
opportunity  for  investments  in  improvements ;  but 
in  a  more  highly  developed,  but  still  progressive 
country,  it  is  obliged,  unless  there  are  opportunities 
for  investments  in  foreign  countries,  to  seek  in- 
vestment in  directly  productive  enterprises  which 
produce  articles  for  the  consumption  of  the  great 
mass  of  the  people.  If  there  is  no  opportunity  for 
foreign  investment  of  capital,  industrial  progress 
will  necessitate  an  improvement  in  the  consumptive 
power  of  the  masses.    Economic  and  ethical  aims 

71 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

begin  to  draw  into  closer  relationship.  The  pos- 
sibility of  enormous  investments  of  capital  in  South 
America  and  Asia  is  something  which  threatens  to 
affect  the  industrial,  social  and  educational  welfare 
of  the  American  people.  "Once  encompass  China 
with  a  network  of  railroads  and  steamer  services, 
the  size  of  the  labor  market  to  be  tapped  is  so 
stupendous  that  it  might  well  absorb  in  its  develop- 
ment all  the  spare  capital  and  business  energy  the 
advanced  European  nations  and  the  United  States 
can  supply  for  generations."^  China  and  the 
Chinese  workers  are  a  danger  because  of  the  low 
standards  of  living  which  prevail  in  the  Asiatic 
nation,  and  the  consequent  ease  with  which  the 
Chinese  people  may  be  exploited.  If  increased 
manufacturing  and  commercial  activity  in  China  is 
not  accompanied  by  a  corresponding  increase  in  the 
standard  of  living,  the  American  farmer  and  the 
American  workman  are  doubtless  imperiled  by 
the  situation.  The  educational  movement  of  the  last 
two  or  three  decades  is  essentially  a  working  class 
movement,  and  its  future  is  bound  up  in  the  wel- 
fare of  the  industrial  and  agricultural  classes. 
*  Hobson,  Imperialism,  p.  334, 


72 


CHAPTER   IV 

NEW  AIMS.  IDEALS  AND   METHODS  IN 
EDUCATION 

The  many  recent  modifications  in  home,  indus- 
trial and  social  life  inevitably  lead  society  toward 
new  social,  educational  and  moral  ideals.  During 
the  last  century  industrial  and  scientific  progress 
outran  all  other  forms  of  development.  A  problem 
of  to-day  is  to  bring  our  educational,  legal,  eco- 
nomic and  social  values  and  ideals  into  harmonious 
relations  with  the  present  industrial  situation. 
There  is  a  continual  conflict  between  the  ideals  and 
customs  established  under  conditions  existing  in 
preceding  generations,  and  newer  ones  called  into 
being  by  changing  economic  and  social  conditions. 
The  aims  and  ideals  which  were  presented  to  the 
schoolboy  and  the  schoolgirl  of  a  generation  ago 
are  not  as  appropriate  and  fitting  now  as  then. 
Society  needs  time  to  adjust  itself  to  the  kaleido- 
scopic changes  of  the  last  quarter  of  a  century. 
Time  is,  indeed,  required  to  remodel  and  to  recon- 
struct our  educational  system  upon  a  new  basis; 
in  order  to  perform  this  task  intelligently,  efficiently, 
and  with  the  least  possible  friction,  consideration 
should  be  given  to  the  aims  and  ideals  which  educa- 
tion ought  to  present  to  the  students  of  to-day. 

73 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

The  haphazard,  patched-up  condition  of  our  school 
curriculum  is  the  result  of  a  conflict  between  the 
traditional  and  the  practical  ideals  in  education. 
The  former  overlooks  almost  completely  the  dy- 
namic view  of  the  world ;  its  eyes  are  turned  back- 
ward toward  the  past.  It  magnifies  the  desirability 
of  disciplinary  and  purely  cultural  studies ;  and  on 
the  other  hand  it  minimizes  the  value  of,  and  often 
sneers  at,  the  practical  and  the  concrete.  An  ex- 
treme example  of  this  spirit  is  presented  in  the 
familiar  story  of  the  old  college  professor  of  higher 
mathematics,  who  chose  that  subject  for  his  spec- 
iality because,  he  believed,  no  practical  use  could 
ever  be  made  of  it.  On  the  contrary,  the  partizans 
of  the  practical  studies  are  prone  to  forget  the  les- 
sons of  the  past,  and  to  see  only  the  immediate 
monetary  value  of  the  training  which  they  advocate. 
The  clamor  and  confusion  arising  from  the  conten- 
tions of  these  two  opposing  factions  have  prevented 
or  retarded  the  general  acceptance  of  certain  aims, 
methods  and  ideals  which  are  of  fundamental  im- 
portance at  the  present  time. 

The  American  public-school  system — the  word 
"system"  reveals  one  of  the  crying  evils  in  educa- 
tional work  and  philosophy.  Everything  is  sys- 
tematized, "routinized,"  standardized,  averaged. 
All  the  children  of  the  nation  are  crowded,  pushed 
or  pulled  through  similar  courses  of  study  at  as 
nearly  uniform  speed  as  possiblcy — a  common  mold 
is  used  for  each  and  for  all.  The  teachers  are 
obliged  to  teach  according  to  a  minutely  prescribed 
system — ten  minutes  for  this  and  fifteen  for  that — 

74 


IDEALS    AND    METHODS 

this  subject  must  be  presented  in  a  certain  manner 
at  a  scheduled  hour,  and  that  by  another  method  at 
another  hour.  Logical,  methodical  development  of 
the  subject  is  made  a  fetish.  No  matter  whether 
the  child  is  well  or  ill,  over  or  under-worked, 
naturally  quick  or  slow  of  comprehension,  or 
whether  he  is  or  is  not  aided  at  home  by  the  parents ; 
the  system  operates  like  clockwork  in  the  vain 
attempt  to  produce  a  fictitious,  although  much  talked 
about,  average  child.  Stern  financial  necessity  is 
the  father  of  much  of  the  routine,  overcrowding 
and  system  found  in  the  public  schools ;  but  on  the 
other  hand  it  is,  in  no  small  measure,  due  to  the 
worship  of  a  methodical  "business"  administration 
which  turns  out  fine,  accurate  and  minutely  detailed 
reports  at  the  expense  of  the  spontaneity,  originality, 
individuality  and  health  of  both  teachers  and  pupils. 
This  demand  for  uniformity  or  standardization  may 
be  partially  attributed  to  the  potent  influence  of  our 
mechanical  and  industrial  processes.  Every  ma- 
chine-made article  must  be  interchangeable  with 
companion  articles;  it  must  not  appreciably  deviate 
from  a  standard.  This  is  what  Veblen  calls  the 
"machine  process."  If  industrial  life  has  been  re- 
duced to  a  rigid  unvarying  system,  the  school  ought 
so  to  conduct  its  work  as  to  impart  variety  and  non- 
uniformity.  If  the  former  tends  to  produce  uni- 
form types  of  workers,  the  latter  must  foster 
individuality,  and  develop  individual  traits  and 
characteristics.  The  school  must  save  the  race  from 
the  monotony  and  dead  uniformity  with  which  it  is 

75 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

threatened  by  modem  industrialism  with  its  stand- 
ardization and  mechanical  repetition. 

For  many  years  the  school  has  been  gradually 
increasing  its  importance  as  a  factor  in  molding  the 
life  and  ideals  of  the  young.  The  family — the 
home  life — has  hitherto  furnished  the  best  field  for' 
individual  instruction,  for  the  development  of 
originality  and  self-reliance.  At  the  time  when 
the  home  influence  is  tending  to  weaken  owing  to 
new  social  and  industrial  conditions,  the  school  is, 
on  the  other  hand,  in  danger  of  becoming  a  mere 
educational  factory.  Mass — factory — instruction  in- 
clines toward  uniformity,  lack  of  originality,  and 
absence  of  personal  initiative  on  the  part  of  those 
thus  instructed.  Three  stages  of  educational  de- 
velopment may  be  discerned;  domestic,  when  prac- 
tically all  instruction  was  given  in  the  home  by  the 
parents  or  masters ;  the  handicraft  stage,  represented 
by  itinerant  teachers  or  the  old  district-school  sys- 
tem when  education  was  confined  to  a  narrow 
formal  curriculum;  and  the  factory  stage,  best 
represented  by  the  graded  schools  of  a  large  city. 
But  as  the  students  are  dissimilar  units  and  must 
fill  dissimilar  roles  in  the  economy  of  the  world, 
artistic,  rather  than  interchangeable,  products  should 
constitute  the  true  output  of  the  school.  The  school 
should  become  a  studio,  rather  than  a  factory;  the 
fourth  stage  will  be  the  arts  and  crafts  stage  of 
educational  development.  Two  great  obstacles 
now  confront  us :  lack  of  money  and  of  well-trained 
teachers. 

;6 


IDEALS    AND    METHODS 

It  is  a  physiological  and  psychological  axiom  that 
men  are  not  created  equal,  they  differ  widely  in 
strength,  endurance,  adaptability  for  certain  kinds 
of  occupation,  and  in  various  other  ways.  If  no 
two  trees  of  the  forest,  or  no  two  flowers  of  the 
garden,  are  exactly  identical,  surely  the  variations 
between  members  of  that  infinitely  more  complex 
organism,  human  society,  must  be  considerable  and 
important !  One  race  of  people  differs  widely  from 
another  in  their  physical,  mental,  and  moral  charac- 
teristics. The  kind  of  education  which  is  best  for 
one  people  is  not  necessarily  good  for  another. 
Differences  and  variations  between  members  of  the 
same  race  or  family  appear  early  in  childhood,  and 
environment  tends  to  accentuate  and  increase  these 
variations.  There  is  no  absolutely  fixed,  unchange- 
able standard  of  educational  values  which  the 
schoolmaster  can  apply  at  all  times  and  under  all 
circumstances.  The  educational  equation  contains 
many  unknown  and  independently  varying  factors. 
The  school  must  accept  graciously  the  existence  of 
these  manifold  differentiations.  It  ought  to  recog- 
nize that  the  education  which  is  efficient  and  appro- 
priate for  one  individual  is  often  extremely  wasteful 
when  applied  to  another,  particularly  in  the  higher 
grades  of  the  public  schools  and  in  the  college  or 
university.  And  moreover,  different  subjects  and 
methods  may  find  appropriate  periods  in  the  life 
of  a  child  when  they  may  be  most  profitably  pre- 
sented and  employed,  when  the  work  of  instruction 
may  proceed  along  the  line  of  least  resistance.  It 
is  not  wise  and  not  proper  to  shirk  this  difficult 

77 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

problem  by  resorting  to  a  purely  imaginary  char- 
acter,— the  average  child — although  the  latter 
course  may  be  much  easier  and  may  prevent  undue 
increase  in  educational  expenditures.  It  is  the  duty 
and  function  of  education  to  bring  to  efficiency  the 
desirable  traits  and  powers  with  which  each  child 
is  endowed.  "Desirable"  is  not  a  fixed  concept,  but 
is  modified  by  time,  place  and  stage  of  civilization. 
"Another  fact  which  sentimental  philanthropy 
habitually  ignores,  is  the  co-existence  of  types  in 
the  moral  world.  This  is  a  fact  parallel  to  that 
coexistence  of  organic  types  which  biology  makes 
clear  to  us.  Though  higher  and  higher  forms  have 
successively  taken  precedence  in  the  struggle  of 
evolution,  this  rarely  means  the  complete  disap- 
pearance of  earlier  types.  Thus,  on  the  earth  to- 
day are  examples  of  the  most  typical  forms  of 
organic  life,  from  the  unicellular  protozoan  to  the 
highest  mammals.  Similarly  in  the  moral  world, 
any  great  city  presents  a  co-existence  of  moral 
types  from  savagery  to  civilization."^  Our  school 
authorities  also  ignore  this  "fact."  The  school  also 
deals  with  many  types  of  moral  nature.  While 
progress — evolution — has  evolved  high  moral  na- 
tures, not  all  have  been  raised  to  these  high  levels ; 
many  are  still  living  upon  a  lower  level, — a  level 
corresponding  to  that  of  generations  now  long  past. 
In  addition  to  the  various  physical  and  intellectual 
t'-aits  of  school  children,  a  great  variety  of  moral 
types  also  complicates  the  situation.  The  ideals 
and  subjects  which  appeal  to  one  child  may  leave 

*  Griggs,  The  Nev}  Uumanism,  p.  i|i. 
78 


IDEALS    AND    METHODS 

his  neighbor  absolutely  unmoved.  As  each  par- 
ticular soil  is  best  adapted  to  some  particular  agri- 
cultural crop,  so  is  each  particular  young  mind  best 
adjusted  to  some  special  form  of  training  and  kind 
of  work.  Furthermore,  barren  soils  by  proper 
treatment  become  fertile;  in  like  manner  will  the 
dull,  unprogressive,  or  apparently  incorrigible  child 
blossom  and  develop  into  an  efficient  and  worthy 
adult  if  he  is  given  proper  treatment  and  proper 
mental  and  bodily  nourishment.  But  individual, 
not  mass,  treatment  is  necessary.  Economic  and 
social  considerations  urge  the  study  of  these  facts. 
The  class  system  ought  to  be  modified  so  as  to  do 
away  with  its  most  objectionable  features. 

Society  is  an  organism  in  which  each  individual 
has  his  appropriate  sphere  of  action.  Progress  is 
fast  or  slow  in  the  proportion  in  which  each  in- 
dividual is  enabled  to  fit  himself  for,  and  to  perform 
his  appropriate  function.  Education  should  be  an 
organized  attempt  to  put  the  right  man  in  the  right 
place.  Many  other  institutions,  manners,  customs, 
traditions,  laws  and  prejudices  oppose  such  efforts, 
but  educational  endeavors  should  be  steadily  and 
everlastingly  directed  toward  this  goal.  Each  in- 
dividual should  strive  to  play  well  his  part  in  the 
great  realistic  drama  of  life;  he  should  not  be 
tempted  to  play  a  part  which  belongs  to  others.  A 
prominent  feature  of  the  work  in  the  school  of  the 
future,  although  it  is  almost  entirely  neglected  at 
the  present  writing,  is  to  be  the  direction  of  the 
student  toward  his  proper  work  and  place  in  life, 
toward  the  niche  for  which  he  is  best  adapted.     Not 

79 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

to  make  professional  men  and  students  of  all;  but 
to  direct  toward,  and  to  fit  each  student  for  the 
work  and  position  in  life  for  which  he  is  best 
suited,  is  indeed  the  ideal  end  and  aim  of  education. 
The  attainment  of  such  a  Utopian  ideal  need  not, 
of  course,  be  expected  under  the  present  social  and 
industrial  environment,  only  approximation  is  an- 
ticipated. The  student  has  been  compared  to  a  bit 
of  raw  material,  and  the  teacher  to  the  mechanic 
whose  duty  it  is  to  be  instrumental  in  adapting  this 
raw  material  to  its  appropriate  form  of  service  and 
in  fashioning  it  into  proper  shape.  Each  bit  of 
human  material  which  comes  into  the  teacher's  hand 
is  unlike  any  other  bit;  no  two  are  identical,  each 
requires  special  treatment.  Each  pupil  should  be 
directed  and  fashioned  so  as  to  nicely  and  properly 
fit  the  groove  in  which  his  life  should  run.  The 
rules  and  regulations  which  have  produced  rigidity 
and  inelasticity  in  our  educational  system  ought  to 
be  modified  with  a  view  of  adapting  instruction  to 
the  child's  requirements  and  peculiar  demands.  It 
is  not  conceived  that  a  committee  shall  examine  the 
student,  and  thereupon  artificially  and  authori- 
tatively decide  upon  the  particular  course  or  occu- 
pation for  which  the  child  is  best  adapted.  And  it 
certainly  is  not  advocated  that  the  school  should  be 
used  to  deepen  or  to  continue  class  demarkation, 
or  to  uphold  the  creed  that  the  son  of  a  working 
man  should,  as  a  matter  of  course,  be  a  manual 
laborer,  and  the  child  of  a  financier,  a  banker.  The 
true  conception  is  that  the  school  should  bring 
to  the  surface  the  latent  possibilities  of  each  and 

80 


IDEALS    AND    METHODS 

every  child.  One  function  of  the  school  is  con- 
ceived to  be  that  of  breaking  down  artificial  in- 
dividual inequalities,  and  replacing  them  by  natural 
individual  differentiations. 

The  modern  ideal  of  a  school  is  not  that  of  a 
mere  place  where  students  congregate  to  listen,  to 
study,  and  to  be  repressed.  It  is  rather  that  of  a 
hive  of  activity,  a  place  where  practical  and  personal 
experience  is  broadened  and  made  intelligible. 
Each  child  brings  to  the  school  certain  valuable 
threads  of  experience  which  ought  to  be  utilized 
when  possible.  If  education  aims  to  fit  all  for  the 
so-called  "genteel"  occupations  or  professions,  these 
will  of  necessity  become  over-crowded,  misery  and 
discontent  will  be  increased  rather  than  be  dimin- 
ished, and  universal  compulsory  education  will 
prove  to  be  a  curse,  not  a  blessing,  to  a  vast  num- 
ber of  its  recipients.  Mr.  Mallock  has  written: 
"In  other  words,  the  only  true  equality  of  educa- 
tional opportunity  is  an  equal  opportunity  for  each, 
not  of  acquiring  the  same  knowledge,  but  of  ac- 
quiring the  knowledge  and  of  developing  the 
faculties  which,  given  his  circumstances  and  given 
his  natural  capacities,  will  do  most  to  make  him  a 
useful,  a  contented,  and  a  happy  man."  Psychology 
assists  the  educator  in  discovering  the  proper  ma- 
terials to  be  given  and  the  appropriate  periods  when 
these  materials  should  be  presented,  as  well  as  the 
correct  methods  of  obtaining  attention,  arousing 
interest,  and  forming  good  habits  of  thought  and 
action.  When  the  proper  material  and  the  correct 
order  of  presentation  are  approximated,  waste  in 
6  8i 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

education  will  be  reduced  to  a  minimum.  But  it 
must  never  be  forgotten  that  the  teacher  always 
deals  with  special  cases.  Sociology,  on  the  other 
hand,  teaches  that  it  is  the  duty  of  each  person  to 
follow  the  occupation  which  psychology  points  out 
for  him;  only  in  this  way  may  the  highest  possible 
development  be  achieved  both  individually  and  col- 
lectively. Judged  from  an  economic  standpoint, 
society  should  prepare  men  in  proper  numbers, 
according  to  the  requirements  of  the  different 
occupations,  and  further  productive  energies  ought 
to  be  so  adjusted  as  to  produce  the  correct  amount 
of  each  different  kind  of  goods,  with  a  view  of 
preventing  a  surplus  or  a  scarcity  of  men  in  any 
trade,  or  an  over  or  under-production  of  any  class 
or  kind  of  goods. 

"Each  mind,"  writes  Emerson,  "has  its  own 
method.  A  true  man  never  acquires  after  college 
rules.  What  you  have  aggregated  in  a  natural 
manner  surprises  and  delights  when  it  is  produced." 
Dislike  of  school  work  is  only  the  external  symptom 
of  a  partially  concealed  cause.  Repression,  the  en- 
deavor to  teach  along  lines  which  are  not  those  of 
natural  development,  the  use  of  second-hand  knowl- 
edge where  first-hand  might  be  utilized,  bear  the 
bitter,  though  natural,  fruits  of  dislike  of  school 
and  its  tasks,  and  destroy  the  desire  for  knowledge 
and  intellectual  growth  and  development.  Prema- 
ture attempts  to  force  the  book,  grammar,  literature, 
spelling,  writing,  upon  the  unprepared  and  unwill- 
ing child,  act  as  a  damper  upon  originality  and 
spontaneity.     Many  pass  through  the  ordeal,  but 

82 


IDEALS    AND    METHODS 

multitudes  fall  by  the  wayside.  How  many  care 
for  books  or  study  who  leave  school  before  grad- 
uating from  the  high  school?  More  drawing 
and  painting,  more  work  with  plastic  materials, 
more  shop  and  laboratory  work,  more  contact  with 
nature,  and  less  memory  drill  and  text-book  study, 
are  needed.  Experience  makes  smooth  the  path 
which  leads  toward  knowledge.  Dry,  unthinking 
repetition  of  texts,  or  study  of  subjects  utterly 
foreign  to  the  child's  experience,  is  almost  valueless. 
A  book  ought  not  to  be  used  until  a  need  is  felt  for 
it.  Think  of  the  mockery,  the  uselessness,  the  utter 
folly  of  teaching  grammar,  for  example,  in  the 
fourth  grade,  to  children  who  are  scarcely  able  to 
comprehend  the  simplest  of  abstract  terms !  Ex- 
pression cannot  be  taught  through  mere  impression. 
We  learn  to  write  by  writing,  to  work  by  working, 
and  to  talk  by  talking.  Hubbard,  of  Roycroft 
Shop,  has  caught  the  educational  ideal  of  the  future 
as  have  few  others.  "In  the  future  our  children 
shall  go  to  school — not  be  sent  or  sentenced.  Noth- 
ing is  of  any  value  except  what  you  work  for. 
Things  given  you  and  thrust  upon  you  are  forever 
alien  to  you — separate  and  apart,  and  will  be 
moulted  very  shortly."  The  world  is  full  of  men 
who  are,  on  account  of  misdirected  ambition,  at 
cross-purposes  with  their  real  work  in  life.  Some 
men  naturally  find  expression  by  means  of  words — 
writing  or  speaking;  others  by  means  of  construc- 
tive work — sculpture,  painting,  architecture,  busi- 
ness, engineering,  commanding  men.  The  school 
has  heretofore  laid  too  much  emphasis  upon  the 

83 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

former;  it  has  faithfully,  almost  fanatically,  tried  to 
make  all  find  expression  in  that  way,  and  has  not 
provided  adequate  opportunity  for  the  latter  sort 
of  expression. 

In  the  city,  for  examole,  man,  not  nature,  forms 
the  chief  item  of  interest  in  the  environment.  The 
city  child's  experience  is  with  human  beings  rather 
than  with  natural  objects.  Stories  of  forests,  caves, 
rivers,  or  mountains  find  no  awakening  response  in 
the  mind  and  heart  of  the  child  of  the  city  whose 
life  is  bounded  by  brick  walls  and  stony  pavements. 
He  is  easily  interested,  however,  in  his  city,  in  its 
streets,  geography,  buildings,  parks  and  markets, 
in  the  methods  of  procuring  and  distributing  its 
food  and  water  supply,  in  the  lighting  of  its  streets 
and  homes.  He  will  be  eager  to  learn  about  the 
occupations  of  its  inhabitants,  of  its  railroads  and 
its  street-car  lines,  of  its  government, — policemen, 
firemen,  council,  mayor,  elections,  etc., — of  its 
schools,  libraries  and  art  galleries.  Interest  excited 
by  such  means  will  give  the  teacher  many  oppor- 
tunities to  lead  the  child  toward  broader,  more  gen- 
eral and  more  imaginative  subjects. 

The  prejudice  against  manual  labor  is  deep- 
seated,  and  the  result  of  the  influence  of  many 
centuries.  It  comes  down  to  us  from  the  days  of 
Aristotle,  from  the  time  of  slavery  and  of  serfdom, 
from  the  age  of  chivalry  and  of  warrior  barons. 
Yet,  it  seems  strangely  out  of  place  in  these  days  of 
universal  suffrage  and  of  democracy  and  in  a  repub- 
lic founded  to  give  equal  rights  to  every  man  and 
special  privileges  to  none.    To  live  in  idleness  and 


IDEALS    AND    METHODS 

luxury  upon  the  fruits  of  the  labors  of  others  was, 
in  past  centuries,  to  live  a  life  of  honor  and  dis-* 
tinction ;  and  this  ancient  and  now  false  dogma  has 
filtered  down  through  the  long  course  of  years  into 
our  life  in  the  latter  part  of  the  nineteenth  and 
the  first  portion  of  the  twentieth  centuries.  The 
most  distasteful  part  of  many  kinds  of  manual  toil 
arise  not  from  the  work  itself,  but  from  the  treat- 
ment accorded  the  toiler  by  his  fellowmen.  To  be 
lowered  in  the  estimation  of  one's  fellows  as  a 
result  of  the  calloused  and  grimy  hand  is  often  the 
real  degradation  and  the  distaste  for  his  trade  which 
is  felt  by  the  manual  worker. 

This  prejudice  is  real  and  is  supported  by  ven- 
erable authority.  Burke  has  written  that  "the 
occupation  of  a  hair-dresser,  or  of  a  working 
tallow-chandler  cannot  be  a  matter  of  honor  to  any 
person," — and  Higher  Authority  also  informs  us  that 
"the  wisdom  of  a  learned  man  cometh  by  oppor- 
tunity of  leisure;  and  he  that  hath  little  business 
shall  become  wise.  How  can  he  get  wisdom  that 
holdeth  the  plough,  and  that  glorieth  in  the  goad; 
that  driveth  oxen  and  is  occupied  in  their  labors, 
and  whose  talk  is  of  bullocks?"  Education  instead 
of  aiming  to  uproot  and  destroy  this  feeling  seems 
rather  to  tend  to  continue  it.  Here  the  finger 
touches  one  of  the  weakest  spots  in  our  public- 
school  system.  In  the  public  school,  children  of  all 
social  classes  are  brought  into  intimate  relations 
upon  a  nearly  equal  basis.  It  should  emphasize  the 
social  value  of  all  kinds  of  work.  It  ought  to  pro- 
claim in  no  uncertain  tones  that  the  man  who  does 

85 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

his  best,  who  makes  the  largest  contribution  to  the 
welfare  and  happiness  of  society,  in  view  of  his 
personal  and  environmental  conditions,  is  worthy 
of  the  highest  praise.  The  educational  system  of 
this  country,  as  a  whole,  still  has  the  conscious  aim 
and  purpose  of  training  each  child  for  mental  or 
clerical  work.  "Not  until  the  term  artisan  has 
come  to  be  as  honorable  as  the  term  artist,"  says 
Bliss  Carmen,  "will  we  have  real  freedom." 

Can  a  modern  industrial  democratic  nation  grow 
so  powerful  that  it  can  overlook  the  common  ele- 
mental necessities  of  man, — food,  clothing  and 
shelter?  Will  not  our  entire  educational  and  in- 
dustrial system  become  top-heavy  and  rotten  at  the 
core,  if  we  neglect  the  proper  education  and  train- 
ing of  that  great  mass  of  future  citizens  who  are  to 
be  voters  as  well  as  toilers  in  the  store,  shop,  and 
on  the  farm?  A  modern  industrial  nation  cannot 
continue  to  progress  unless  the  manual  workers  are 
efficient  and  well  cared  for;  and  a  modern  demo- 
cratic nation  cannot  hope  to  be  progressive  unless 
the  great  body  of  its  citizens  are  intelligent.  All 
cannot  be  lawyers,  politicians,  doctors,  captains  of 
industry,  bankers,  clerks,  agents,  and  the  like;  yet, 
there  is  to-day  a  surplus  of  this  class  of  people. 
Increased  cost  of  living  and  scarcity  of  efficient 
workers  in  the  face  of  great  improvements  in  the 
methods  of  production  indicate  that  there  is  an 
over-supply  of  indirectly  productive  workers  and  of 
non-producers.  Our  schools  have  not  compre- 
hended their  responsibility  for  this  situation. 

86 


IDEALS    AND    METHODS 

The  Austrian  sociologist,  Gumplowicz,  observes 
that  "fortune  hunting,  an  idea  that  the  peasant 
never  knows  and  seldom  incites  the  nobleman,  is 
the  great  object  which  attracts  the  middle  class." 
This  quotation  affords  an  explanation  of  the  great 
predominance  of  wealth-seeking  in  the  United 
States,  of  the  emphasis  which  is  laid  upon  the 
accumulation  of  great  wealth.  We  have  been,  and 
are,  a  nation  of  middle-class  people,  ideals  of  trade, 
commerce  and  business  profits  appealed  to  all  in  the 
past;  but  recent  industrial  progress  has  narrowed 
the  opportunities  to  pass  from  the  position  of  an 
employee  to  that  of  doing  business  for  "one's  self." 
Hard  and  fast  lines  of  demarkation  between  the 
employed  and  the  employer  classes  are  becoming 
clearly  defined  and  hard  to  overlook.  The  conflict 
is  now  on  between  two  diverse  sets  of  ideals, — the 
business  man's  and  that  of  the  wage-earner, — 
although  older  ideals  still  survive  which  are  almost 
wholly  unfitted  to  modern  life. 

Many  of  these  time-v/orn  and  traditional  ideals  are 
still  held  up  before  the  child  in  the  public  schools ; 
these  were  adapted  to  a  local  environment,  and 
considered  only  the  needs  of  the  so-called  upper 
and  middle  classes.  Men  like  Pestalozzi,  Froebel,  and 
Herbert  Spencer  foreshadowed  coming  events  and 
insisted  upon  other  educational  aims  and  ideals. 
The  Grecian,  the  Roman,  and  the  medieval  ideals 
were  all  adjusted  to  small  localized,  non-industrial 
communities,  resting  upon  the  basis  of  slavery  or 
serfdom.  Still  held  under  the  spell  of  these  now 
outgrown  ideals,  the  child  is  taught  to  emulate  the 

87 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

warrior,  the  man  of  leisure,  the  statesman,  the  cap- 
tain of  industry,  totally  unmindful  of  the  obvious 
fact  that  only  a  small,  decreasing  percentage  can 
reach  such  positions.  We  are  everlastingly  pro- 
claiming and  boasting  that  there  is  room  at  the  top ; 
but  w^e  are  apparently  little  concerned  with  the  wel- 
fare of  that  great  mass  of  humanity  which  must, 
of  necessity,  occupy  what  are  commonly  called  the 
lower  rungs  of  the  ladder.  Our  educational  efforts 
are  chiefly  devoted  to  preparation  for  a  few  posi- 
tions ;  our  educational  system  is,  if  we  except  some 
recent  hopeful  tendencies,  crowding  all  toward  these 
as  a  goal.  Yet,  society  is  much  like  a  pyramid ;  its 
stability  depends  upon  the  nature  of  its  base  rather 
than  upon  that  of  its  apex.  A  world  environment, 
world  markets,  universal  education,  the  uplift  of 
the  working  classes,  make  obsolete  old  ideals, 
customs  and  manners.  Let  us  hold  up  before  the 
eyes  of  the  young  men  and  women  of  to-day,  new 
twentieth  century  ideals : — the  inventor,  the  engi- 
neer, the  chemist,  the  wise  physician,  the  scientific 
farmer,  the  skilled  mechanic,  the  woman  who  un- 
derstands the  economics  of  the  household,  the 
worker,  mental  or  manual,  who  excels  in  his  line  of 
work,  whether  that  work  be  the  direction  of  the 
affairs  of  a  nation,  of  a  farm,  or  of  a  household. 
Forever  past  is  that  epoch  in  the  world's  history 
when  warriors  and  kings  appear  to  be  the  sole 
makers  of  history.  To-day  work,  not  idleness,  is 
demanded.  Production,  not  destruction,  utilization, 
not  waste,  are  demanded  of  men.    We  must  teach 


IDEALS    AND    METHODS 

that  it  is  braver,  better,  and  more  useful  to  live 
nobly  than  to  die  heroically. 

In  support  of  this  contention  the  following  quota- 
tion from  an  article  written  by  a  well-known  social 
settlement  worker  and  philanthropist,  Mr.  J.  G.  P. 
Stokes,  is  worthy  of  attention :  "Until  recently 
it  appears  to  have  escaped  public  notice  that  this 
constant  emphasis  [given  by  the  school]  upon  the 
importance  of  personal  success,  unless  safeguarded 
by  suitable  ethical  training,  tends  subtly  to  the  de- 
velopment of  selfish  propensities,  that  lead  the 
individual  to  disregard  or  subordinate  the  interests 
of  others,  in  the  furtherance  of  personal  ends,  and 
that  lead  to  unsocial  attitudes,  and  to  unfriendly 
rivalries  and  ill-feeling,  and  to  wrong  doings  of 
every  sort.  The  constant  encouragement  given  to 
personal  ambition  for  personal  triumph  and  per- 
sonal reward  tends  to  develop  a  desire  similar  to 
that  possessed  by  the  criminal  offender,  who,  in 
seeking  his  personal  gratification,  gives  no  proper 
regard  or  consideration  to  the  relation  of  his  acts 
or  of  his  course  to  the  welfare  of  others  or  to  the 
welfare  of  the  community."  The  grasping  monopo- 
list is  but  one  remove  from  the  robber  baron  of  the 
Middle  Ages.  Just  as  the  latter,  after  he  had 
served  his  purpose,  was  finally  forced  by  organized 
society  to  cease  his  depredations,  so  must  the  former 
be  shorn  of  his  power  to  divert  social  income  into 
private  pockets,  to  levy  toll  upon  the  public.  The 
school — a  democratic  institution — ought  to  accel- 
erate, not  retard,  this  process.  Let  the  lure  of  per- 
sonal success  which  causes  one  to  ride  rough-shod 

89 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

over  one's  fellows  and  which  introduces  the  crude 
ethics  of  the  struggle  known  as  the  survival  of  the 
fittest,  be  no  longer  held  out  by  our  teachers.  In 
the  school,  at  least,  we  may  hope  higher  and  nobler 
ideals  will  find  a  resting  place.  These  words  of 
President  Roosevelt  form  a  fitting  motto  to  be  hung 
on  the  wall  in  every  schoolroom  of  the  land,  "To 
each  man  there  comes  normally  the  chance  so  to 
lead  his  life  that  at  the  end  of  his  days  his  children, 
his  wife,  those  that  are  dear  to  him,  shall  rise  up 
and  call  him  blessed,  and  so  that  his  neighbors  and 
those  who  have  been  brought  into  intimate  asso- 
ciation may  feel  that  he  has  done  his  part  as  a  man 
in  the  world  which  sadly  needs  that  each  man 
should  play  his  part  well." 

The  city  boy  or  girl  has  little  or  no  useful  work 
to  do.  This  constitutes  one  of  the  serious  menaces 
and  dangers  of  city  life,  and  furnishes  an  explana- 
tion of  the  marked  superiority  of  the  country  boy 
over  the  city  youth  of  past  generations.  Socrates 
taught  that  to  deprive  a  child  of  the  opportunity  to 
perform  useful  services  was  to  deprive  him  of  much 
needed  experience  in  life.  President  Eliot  believes 
that  "enabling  the  children  to  make  something,  or 
do  something,  which  is  acceptable  to  other  people 
ought  to  be  a  leading  object  at  every  school."  The 
early  years  of  one's  life  should  be  a  preparation 
for  useful  work  in  after  years.  Work  is  the  natural 
occupation  of  each  and  every  individual.  Service, 
not  wealth,  should  be  the  end  and  aim  of  human 
activities;  the  present  interdependence  of  individ- 
uals and  the  complexity  of  modern  industry  teaches 

90 


IDEALS    AND    METHODS 

this  lesson.  Varied  industry  is  best  for  all,  but 
modern  life  is  drifting  toward  extreme  specializa- 
tion. Pure  mental  labor  or  pure  manual  labor  nar- 
rows and  stunts  the  growth  of  the  individual. 
This  man  may  be  best  adapted  to  perform  mental 
work;  but  if  he  never  uses  his  hands,  muscles,  and 
eyes  in  hard  or  skilled  manual  work,  a  vast  field  of 
experience  remains  forever  as  a  sealed  book  to  him ; 
the  laborer  cut  off  from  all  opportunity  for  mental 
growth  and  enjoyment  is  placed  close  to  the  level 
of  the  animal,  or  of  the  machine.  In  order  to  in- 
sure well-rounded  development,  mental  and  manual 
work  should  fall  to  the  lot  of  every  man  and 
woman,  irrespective  of  all  artificial  class  distinc- 
tions. Manual  training  and  domestic  science  have 
been  introduced  into  the  curriculum  of  the  public 
schools  as  the  result  of  an  attempt  to  remedy  the 
lack  of  opportunity  for  useful  manual  work  in  the 
life  of  the  majority  of  our  city  school  children.  At 
present  this  work  is  not  entirely  satisfactory.  The 
problems  given  are  necessarily  artificial,  and  do  not 
savor  sufficiently  of  the  actual  practical  work  and 
conditions  outside  the  schoolroom.  Occasionally 
this  obstacle  is  partially  surmounted  and  the  boy 
may,  at  irregular  intervals,  make  some  useful  arti- 
cles for  the  home,  or  the  girl  prepare  a  meal  for 
guests  at  the  school. 

The  monastic  ideal  of  education  is  now  obsolete; 
education  should  be  an  integral  part  of  life.  In 
order  to  better  prepare  for  future  usefulness  of  the 
students,  school  work  and  practical  work  should  be 
drawn    closer    together.     Coordination    of    theory 

91 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

and  practice,  both  as  to  time  and  place,  is  desirable. 
The  customary  wide  separation  of  the  two  is  the 
cause  of  serious  waste  of  human  energy.  Both 
industry  and  the  students  are  injured  by  the  isola- 
tion of  the  high  school,  the  college  and  the  uni- 
versity from  the  practical  affairs  of  the  industrial 
and  commercial  world;  but  improvement  in  this 
direction  is  noticeable,  particularly  in  many  of  our 
state  universities.  The  professors  are  taking  an 
active  interest  in  the  industrial,  political,  technical 
and  scientific  progress  of  the  world,  and  the  stu- 
dents are  being  taught  to  consider  the  present  as 
well  as  the  past.  When  the  practical  side  of  edu- 
cation is  considered,  however,  the  average  teacher 
of  to-day  is  found  to  be  an  obstacle.  As  Professor 
De  Garmo,  of  Cornell  University,  once  said  in  a 
lecture,  "The  teaching  profession  is  filled  with 
uneconomic  women  and  quiet-loving  men."  An- 
other lecturer  was  so  impressed  by  this  condition 
that  he  asserted,  "All  teachers  should  work  a  por- 
tion of  the  time,  in  order  that  they  may  come  into 
actual  contact  with  the  industrial  and  economic  life 
and  problems  of  to-day."  These  may  be  extreme 
views,  but  they  point  out  a  real  evil  in  regard  to  the 
teachers  in  our  public  schools,  and  in  many  colleges 
and  universities, — an  evil  which  is  plainly  seen  by 
our  workingmen.  Undoubtedly,  "that  which  is 
treated  with  respect  in  school,  whether  it  be  arith- 
metic or  grammar,  cotton  picking  or  hog  raising, 
religion  or  politics,  will  rarely  be  an  object  of  con- 
tempt after  school." 

93 


IDEALS    AND    METHODS 

Although  cultural  studies  ought  not  to  be  omitted 
or  neglected,  after  all,  preparation  for  earning  a 
livelihood  is  an  extremely  important  duty.  Educa- 
tion should  impart  power  to  do  and  ability  to  ac- 
complish. The  world  needs  the  doer  and  the 
thinker  united  in  one  individual.  Do  our  high 
schools,  colleges,  or  universities  emphasize  suffi- 
ciently this  practical  side  of  school  training?  Se- 
clusion and  quiet  do  not  impart  the  power  to  do, 
and  uneconomical  and  parasitic  conditions  do  not 
aid  in  producing  future  breadwinners.  The  high 
school  and  the  college  are  open  to  the  young  men 
and  women  who  have  leisure,  whose  parents  are 
financially  able  to  support  them  through  a  long 
period  of  dependence,  but  entrance  through  their 
portals  is  extremely  difficult  for  young  workers. 
Many  of  the  most  desirable  and  capable  students 
are  obliged  to  leave  school  at  an  early  age  on  ac- 
count of  financial  circumstances.  Their  parents 
are  unable  to  keep  them  in  school ;  they  must  earn 
their  own  bread  and  butter.  Our  public-school 
system  should  stand  ready  to  assist  this  class  of 
young  people.  Universal  public  education  is  a 
delusion  if  the  children  of  the  less  financially  able 
are  not  allowed  to  receive  its  benefits  because  school 
and  business  hours  conflict.  Night-school  work, 
half-day  work,  or  some  arrangement  between  shop, 
office  or  store  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  school  on 
the  other,  should  be  tried.  No  class  of  students 
can  excel  a  wide-awake,  energetic  class  of  bread- 
winners, and,  it  may  be  added,  the  best  kind  of  a 
worker  is  also  a  student.     The   student  and  the 

93 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

worker  combined  simultaneously  in  one  individual 
is  excellent.  Work  during  vacation  is  good,  but 
work  during  the  school  term  is  better.  Contact 
with  the  material  and  practical  things  of  the  world 
makes  one  a  better  student.  Hard  and  fast  cur- 
ricula must  bend  to  the  wind  of  modern  necessity; 
the  public  school  must  open  its  doors  to  the  young 
workers. 

To  be  thrown  upon  one's  own  resources  is  rarely 
an  evil,  and  is  usually  a  benefit.  Many  high-school 
and  college  boys  would  be  gainers  in  the  end  if 
their  allowances  and  remittances  were  reduced  to  a 
minimum.  It  is  undoubtedly  true  that  the  youth 
of  to-day  requires  a  longer  probationary  period  than 
the  child  of  more  primitive  people,  but  it  is  also 
true  that  the  best  and  most  logical  way  to  prepare 
a  student  for  service  in  the  great  world  of  affairs 
is  not  that  of  keeping  him  a  dependent  and  non- 
producer  up  to  the  very  day  when  he  is  launched 
upon  the  unknown  sea  of  business  or  professional 
life.  A  life  of  economic  dependence,  and  isolation 
from  the  business  and  industrial  world,  have  proven 
stumbling  blocks  in  the  career  of  many  promising 
young  men. 

The  world  is  one  vast  moving  panorama.  New 
scenes,  new  conditions,  new  kinds  of  people,  are 
constantly  coming  into  view.  Industrial,  economic, 
educational  and  moral  forms  and  problems  are 
subject  to  constant  modification.  Everything  is 
dynamic,  nothing  is  static.  The  ideals  and  needs 
of  to-day  differ  from  those  of  yesterday,  and  those 
of  to-day  may  not  be  desirable  to-morrow.  Edu- 
94 


IDEALS    AND    METHODS 

cation  should  aim  to  keep  abreast  of  this  great, 
throbbing,  changeable  world  current,  but  the  in- 
dustrial development  and  social  changes  have  been 
so  rapid  during  the  recent  decades  that  educational 
development  has,  of  necessity,  lagged  far  behind. 
The  ideals  evolved  during  a  century  of  great 
material  progress  and  of  rapid  exploitation  of  na- 
tural resources,  are  not  adapted  to  a  century  in 
which  distribution,  not  production,  of  wealth  fur- 
nishes the  most  vital  problems.  Therefore,  only 
through  the  introduction  of  new  aims,  ideals  and 
methods  into  the  theory  and  practice  of  education 
can  the  school  become  an  efficient  tool,  working  for 
social  and  economic  progress  in  the  present  era. 


95 


CHAPTER   V 

WOMAN   AND  INDUSTRY 

In  considering  the  education  of  the  girl,  the  edu- 
cator and  the  economist  are  brought  face  to  face 
with  a  condition  which  is  both  unique  and  perplex- 
ing; old  theories  and  traditions  of  woman's  work, 
education  and  sphere  of  influence  do  not  square 
with  the  necessities  and  limitations  of  to-day. 
Nevertheless,  these  inherited  prejudices  and  tradi- 
tions are  particularly  deep-seated  and  abiding; 
although  changed  home  environment  and  the  altered 
functions  of  the  home  call  for  a  modified  view  as 
to  the  position  of  women.  As  a  necessary  prelim- 
inary to  the  consideration  of  the  education  of 
women,  a  survey  must  be  made  of  the  effect  which 
modern  industrial  progress  has  produced  upon  the 
social  and  industrial  functions  of  women.  The 
decline  of  domestic  or  household  industry  and  the 
rise  of  the  factory  system  have  greatly  modified 
the  internal  organization  of  the  home.  Recent 
industrial  transformations  have  altered  the  relations 
between  husband  and  wife,  and  between  parents 
and  their  children.  Industrial  evolution  during 
the  last  two  or  three  decades  has  not  only  increased 
the  educational  value  of  the  school  relatively  to  that 
of  the  home,  but  it  has  exerted  a  tremendous 
96 


WOMAN    AND    INDUSTRY 

influence  upon  woman  as  the  mother  of  the  race. 
Any  discussion  of  the  education  of  women  which 
overlooks  or  minimizes  the  importance  of  these 
facts  is  superficial  and  almost  valueless. 

Primitive  industry  was  placed  almost  entirely 
in  the  hands  of  the  female  sex.  Woman  was  the 
primitive  world's  worker.  But  as  the  centuries 
glided  by  her  sphere  of  industrial  duties  passed 
through  many  modifications.  Gradually,  almost 
imperceptibly,  her  sphere  of  activities  was  con- 
tracted until  it  finally  comprised  only  household 
duties.  But  the  march  of  industrial  progress  in 
recent  decades  has  gradually  diminished  the  amount 
of  household  work.  As  year  after  year  has  rolled' 
over  the  threshold  of  the  present,  the  home  has  lost, 
one  by  one,  many  of  its  important  and  characteristic: 
functions.  Particularly  when  located  in  a  city  it 
offers  very  little  opportunity  for  observation  of,  or 
participation  in,  constructive  work  of  any  kind. 
The  home  chores  are  few ;  there  is  no  wood  to  split, 
no  garden  to  hoe,  no  cow  to  milk;  no  blacksmith- 
ing  is  done,  no  shoes  are  made,  no  cloth  is  spun, 
no  wagon  or  sled  is  constructed;  all  this  work  is 
now  performed  elsewhere.  In  fact,  the  city  home 
provides  no  regular  or  systematic  work  of  any  im- 
portance for  the  youth,  and  the  facilities  furnished 
for  healthful  play  and  recreation  are  also  inade- 
quate. The  home  was  formerly  a  workshop,  school, 
sleeping  place,  nursery,  dining  room,  hospital, 
kitchen  and  laundry.  Besides  furnishing  protec- 
tion and  shelter  to  parents  and  children,  it  combined 
the  practice  of  many  useful  arts  under  one  roof. 
7  97 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

Gradually  its  varied  functions  have  been  dropping 
from  it,  and  have  been  transferred  to  specialized 
workmen  who  occupy  isolated  workshops.  Tools, 
shoes,  clothing,  furniture,  butter,  cheese,  etc.,  are 
now  rarely  manufactured  in  the  home.  In  many 
cases  laundry  work  is  performed  elsewhere;  much 
of  the  cooking  is  done  by  outsiders ;  canned  goods, 
bread,  pastry,  breakfast  foods,  and  even  warm 
cooked  meals  are  prepared  outside  and  brought  into 
the  home  ready  to  eat.  Cooperative  housekeeping 
is  a  possibility,  if  not  a  probability,  of  the  near 
future.  Modification  is  constantly  taking  place. 
The  school  is  stretching  out  its  arms  toward  the 
nursery,  and  is  welcoming  the  little  child  into  the 
pleasant  and  healthful  atmosphere  of  the  kinder- 
garten. The  sick  are  often  sent  to  the  hospital 
instead  of  attempting  to  care  for  them  in  the  incon- 
venient and  ill-prepared  home.  The  physician  and 
the  dentist  examine  and  prescribe  for  the  school 
children  in  some  of  our  large  cities  and  in  many 
German  municipalities.  The  reduction  in  the 
amount  of  industrial  activity  carried  on  in  the  home, 
and  the  changes  resulting  therefrom,  are  vital 
factors  in  any  study  of  the  education  of  the  girl. 
If  no  attention  is  paid  to  these  changes,  if  we 
resolutely  close  our  eyes  and  say  there  should  be 
no  modification  in  the  sphere  of  woman's  activity, 
discussion  is  futile  and  leads  to  mere  dogmatism. 

Although  the  modern  home  still  performs  many 
of  the  functions  of  the  primitive  one,  modern  home 
life  differs  greatly  from  primitive  home  life. 
iWhile  the  effect  of  the  influence  of  home  and  of 

98 


WOMAN    AND    INDUSTRY 

parents  upon  the  young  ought  not  to  be  under- 
rated, it  must  be  conceded  that  the  complexity  of 
modern  life  subjects  the  child  of  to-day  to  many 
influences  which  did  not  affect  the  child  of  former 
generations.  This  change  must  be  acknowledged 
and  considered.  Whether  it  be  for  better  or  for 
worse  need  not  be  here  debated ;  the  situation  exists. 
The  reality  must  be  faced  and  the  problems  resulting 
therefrom  solved.  The  life  of  the  past  is  forever 
behind  us;  the  present  and  the  future  alone  vitally 
concern  us.  During  recent  years  a  considerable 
percentage  of  the  women  of  the  United  States  have 
passed  from  under  the  influence  of  what  Professor 
Patten  would  call  an  intensely  "local"  environment 
into  contact  with  a  "general"  environment;  as  a 
result  the  "clinging  vine"  is  no  longer  the  ideal 
toward  which  the  eyes  of  American  women  are 
turned.  The  wife  and  mother  is  not  kept  so  closely 
within  the  home  as  she  was  in  past  generations. 
She  has  acquired  a  host  of  interests  and  duties  of 
which  our  grandmothers  knew  nothing,  and  she  is 
interesting  herself  in  national,  state,  municipal  and 
educational  affairs.  The  woman  whose  mental 
horizon  is  limited  by  the  four  walls  of  her  home, 
or  by  the  confines  of  her  immediate  neighborhood, 
must  perforce  entertain  narrow  and  warped  views 
of  life ;  but  these  new  interests  lie  outside  the  home 
circle,  and  necessarily  exercise  a  broadening  and 
strengthening  influence  upon  her.  The  American 
woman  has  become  a  powerful  factor  in  the  land, 
and  her  direct  influence  is  destined  to  increase 
rather  than  to  diminish.     Society  will  ultimately  be 

99 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

obliged  to  cease  clinging  blindly  and  tenaciously 
to  an  ideal  only  appropriate  to  the  past.  The 
familiar  traditional  home  and  housewife  were  fitted 
to  the  period  of  domestic  industry  in  the  days 
before  industrial  progress  had  taken  many  strides 
toward  the  great  industry  with  its  necessary  ac- 
companiment,— subdivision  of  labor.  Female  in- 
dustry is  at  present  going  through  even  a  greater 
and  more  trying  transformation  than  that  through 
which  the  work  of  men  has  passed ;  woman's  work 
is  still  in  the  transitional  stage. 

If  the  old  view  of  woman's  work  and  field  of 
activity  is  not  abandoned,  the  woman  of  the  future 
must  of  necessity  become  more  or  less  of  an  idler, 
a  dependent,  or  else  assume  the  thankless  and  dis- 
couraging role  of  a  person  who  performs,  in  a 
wasteful  and  laborious  way,  tasks  which  could  and 
should  be  done  much  more  economically  and  much 
better  outside  the  four  walls  of  home,  in  specially 
prepared  and  efficiently  equipped  plants  and  work- 
shops. The  change  from  the  domestic  to  the  fac- 
tory system  "has  released  a  vast  amount  of  labor 
formerly  done  within  the  home  by  women  with 
these  results :  either  this  labor  has  been  diverted 
to  other  places,  or  into  other  channels,  or  has 
become  idle."  Public  opinion  has  prevented  much 
of  this  labor  from  being  "diverted  to  other  places," 
and  has  also  retarded  the  movement  of  certain 
forms  of  work  out  from  the  home.  Sewing,  cook- 
ing and  canning,  for  example,  have  by  no  means 
entirely  departed  from  the  home,  and  may  not  for 
many  years  be  entirely  performed  outside  the  home. 

100 


WOMAN    AND    INDUSTRY 

Some  writers  have  noticed  that  the  movement  of 
industry  out  of  the  home  has  caused  eras  of  fancy- 
work,  and  of  club  work — "intellectual  fancy-work." 
Middle-class  women,  not  wishing  to  be  idle,  have 
diverted  their  energies  into  these  channels  with 
results  which  have  not  always  been  hopeful  and 
encouraging.  Idleness  or  useless  forms  of  work 
are  as  undesirable  in  the  case  of  woman  as  in  the 
case  of  man.  Work  and  useful  activity  are  the 
birthright  and  the  boon  of  each  and  of  all,  both 
male  and  female. 

At  present  there  is,  undoubtedly,  a  growing 
tendency  for  woman  to  follow  her  work  out  of  the 
household.  In  1900,  according  to  the  census  re- 
ports, there  were  21,776,754  females  in  the  United 
States,  between  the  ages  of  fifteen  and  sixty  in- 
clusive. About  one  third  of  this  number,  or  about 
7,250,000,  may  be  considered  to  be  urban  dwellers. 
The  number  of  female  wage-earners  reported  was 
1,031,609.  It  is  safe  to  assume  that  nearly  all  of 
the  wage-earners  lived  in  the  cities  and  towns. 
Therefore,  on  the  basis  of  this  assumption,  about 
one  in  every  seven  adult  females  living  in  the  cities 
of  the  United  States  is  a  wage-earner,  and  goes 
outside  the  home  to  earn  wages.  A  large  per- 
centage of  these  women,  however,  are  unmarried, 
so  it  is  safe  to  assume  that  this  movement,  in  so  far 
as  it  has  up  to  date  affected  the  home,  is  not  as 
significant  as  the  statistics  indicate.  Nevertheless, 
the  inevitable  tendency  will  be  to  add  continually  to 
the  labor-avoiding  methods  of  doing  housework, 
more  work  will  in  the  future  go  out  of  the  home, 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

and  the  house  of  the  future  will  be  simplified.  The 
dirt  problem  which  is  one  of  the  most  vital  and  dis- 
tressing of  domestic  problems  will  be  made  less  dif- 
ficult to  solve  by  the  removal  of  the  smoke  nuisance, 
by  the  use  of  central  heating  plants  exactly  as  we 
now  use  central  lighting  plants,  and  by  the  reduc- 
tion in  the  number  of  creases,  carvings  and  corners 
in  furniture  and  house  furnishing  which  offer  con- 
venient receptacles  for  dirt  and  dust. 

The  women  of  the  race  are  standing  at  the  part- 
ing of  the  ways.  Two  alternatives  are  offered 
them :  useful  and  efficient  labor  to  be  performed 
outside  the  traditional  household,  or  leisure  and 
sex-parasitism.  Although  sporadic  and  isolated 
exceptions  may  exist  in  many  places  for  several 
generations  to  come,  the  modern  tendency  toward 
specialization  and  large  scale  industry  leaves  no 
permanent  middle  ground.  When  an  old  art  is 
dying  out  in  consequence  of  being  superseded  by  a 
new  art,  attempts  are  invariably  made  to  complicate 
needlessly  the  processes  employed  in  the  old  art, — 
to  make  work.^  The  eiforts  of  the  various  house- 
keeping magazines  point  toward  the  decline  and 
decay  of  household  industry  as  a  separate  and  uni- 
fied form  of  industry.  One  of  the  important  func- 
tions of  these  numerous  journals  is  that  of  earnestly 
striving  to  dignify  useless  work  through  the  intro- 
duction of  various  and  sundry  complications.^ 
This  situation  should  be  discussed  from  the  eco- 
nomic viewpoint  and  from  that  of  race  preservation. 

*  Mitchell,  The  Past  in  the  Present,  p.  22. 
'  Commander,  The  American  Idea,  Chap.  XI. 
102 


WOMAN    AND    INDUSTRY 

A  score  of  years  ago  Professor  Lester  F.  Ward 
wrote:  "Woman  is  half  of  mankind.  Civilization 
and  progress  have  hitherto  been  carried  forward  by 
the  male  half  alone.  Labor  and  production  are  now 
suffering  from  the  same  cause.  It  is  high  time  that 
all  the  forces  of  society  were  brought  into  action, 
and  it  is  especially  necessary  that  those  vast  com- 
plement forces  which  woman  alone  can  wield  be 
given  free  rein,  and  the  whole  machinery  of  society 
be  set  in  full  and  harmonious  operation."^  From 
an  economic  point  of  view  there  is  much  to  be  said 
in  favor  of  the  above  argument.  Women  are 
gradually  entering  industrial  and  professional  pur- 
suits. If  many  of  this  sex  are  drafted  into  the 
industrial  field  the  amount  of  leisure  time  for  the 
workers  should  be  increased.  Every  transfer  from 
the  class  of  useless  workers  or  the  class  of  idlers  to 
the  ranks  of  useful  labor  ought,  in  a  normal  econ- 
omy, to  tend  to  reduce  working  hours  and  to  in- 
crease leisure.  The  entrance  of  women  into  industry 
should,  therefore,  be  accompanied  by  a  decrease  in 
the  average  number  of  hours  worked  per  day  by  all 
workers.  If,  however,  it  is  accompanied  by  long 
hours  and  the  displacement  of  considerable  num- 
bers of  male  workers,  a  fall  in  the  standard  of  living 
of  large  numbers  of  the  laboring  population  seems 
inevitable.  The  normal  result  of  an  orderly,  sys- 
tematic introduction  of  women  into  industry  would 
be  increased  leisure  for  all  and  higher  standards  of 
living.  In  reality,  this  social  change,  like  all  others, 
will  be  accompanied  by  more  or  less  suffering  and 

^Dynamic  Sociology,  Vol.  I  :  657. 
103 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

hardship.  Increased  leisure  ought  not  to  mean 
idleness;  but  social  enjoyment,  intellectual  enjoy- 
ment, or  the  pursuit  of  an  avocation.  The  same 
economic  laws  and  the  same  law  of  wages  apply  to 
woman  as  to  man.  If  women  are  partially  sub- 
sidized, if  some  work  below  a  "living  wage,"  the 
wages  of  all  women  are  affected  and  incidentally 
those  of  men,  unless  union  organization  prevents 
this  undesirable  result. 

Race  degeneration  and  decay  first  manifest  them- 
selves in  womankind.  The  future  of  the  American 
people  is  wrapped  up  in  the  solution  of  the  problem 
of  the  future  sphere  of  woman's  activity.  If  wo- 
man goes  outside  the  home  in  order  to  become  an 
industrial  or  professional  worker,  we  are  face  to 
face  with  a  serious  problem  as  to  the  care  and 
training  of  children,  and  the  maintenance  of  marital 
relations.  It  has  been  repeatedly  and  vociferously 
declared,  with  a  large  measure  of  truth,  that  when 
married  women  become  wage-earners  in  industries 
carried  on  outside  the  home,  the  cleanliness,  health- 
fulness  and  moral  influence  of  the  home  is  unfavor- 
ably affected.  Granting  that  this  be  true,  it  may 
reasonably  be  asked:  Is  not  this  evil  situation  due, 
on  the  one  hand,  to  unfavorable  conditions  now 
obtaining  in  modern  industry,  and,  on  the  other 
hand,  to  the  fact  that  the  work  of  the  household 
has  not  as  yet  been  sufficiently  simplified  ?  Are  not 
the  evils  which  now  rise  so  ominously  above  the 
social  horizon  those  which  must  inevitably  accom- 
pany an  era  of  transition?  Are  we  not  mistaking, 
because  of  insufficient  investigation,  merely  tem- 
104 


WOMAN    AND    INDUSTRY 

porary  and  superficial  ills  for  permanent  and  deep- 
seated  diseases?  Shorter  hours  and  better  sanitary 
arrangements  in  factories  will  undoubtedly  follow 
the  entrance  of  large  numbers  of  women  into  in- 
dustry, and  the  organization  of  female  workers  into 
strong  labor  organizations  affiliated  with  those  of 
men.  Thus  the  peculiar  evils  of  factory  work  will 
be  diminished. 

Industrial  history  unmistakably  points  to  the 
conclusion  that  woman's  household  industry  is 
doomed.  Little  will  permanently  remain,  and  what 
does  remain  can,  in  a  large  measure,  be  most 
efficiently  performed  by  specialized  workers  going 
from  one  household  to  another.  Household  work 
when  thus  performed  will  attain  a  professional 
dignity  which  has  hitherto  been  entirely  lacking. 
Scrubbing  and  baking,  brewing  and  sewing  on  a 
small  scale  cannot  be  as  readily  dignified  as  when 
performed  on  a  large  scale.  Scientific  precision 
and  expert  knowledge  may  find  profitable  applica- 
tion to  these  occupations  when  performed  on  a  large 
scale.  The  chief  cook  in  a  large  hotel  or  apartment 
house  may  well  rank  in  professional  standing  along- 
side the  physician.  The  operators  of  a  compressed 
air  carpet  cleaner  are  a  grade  above  the  man  with 
the  wire  carpet  beater.  The  worker  in  an  airy, 
well-ventilated  garment  factory  is  more  expert  than 
the  sewing-machine  operator  in  the  sweat  shop, 
or  in  the  home  dressmaking  establishment.  The 
two  important  questions  are :  How  can  industry  be 
so  modified  as  to  make  it  healthful  for  workers 
whether  they  be  men  or  women?  How  can  women 
105 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

be  best  prepared  for  industrial  and  professional 
occupations  under  the  new  conditions?  The  first 
question  must  be  answered  by  means  of  legislation 
and  trade  unionism,  the  second  by  our  educational 
authorities. 

If  these  two  problems  are  resolutely  studied  there 
is  no  good  historical  reason  for  believing  that  racial 
deterioration  must  be  the  inevitable  result  of  wo- 
man's work  outside  the  home.  The  mothers  in  all 
nations,  when  the  latter  were  at  the  summit  of  their 
national  strength,  have  invariably  been  workers,  not 
idlers  or  parasites.  One  of  the  dangers  which  flow 
out  of  the  enormous  multiplication  in  wealth  pro- 
duction in  modern  times  is  idleness — parasitism — 
on  the  part  of  large  classes  of  men  and  women. 
In  the  past  history  of  the  world  parasitism  affected 
only  a  small  percentage  of  the  population.  But  in 
recent  years  the  productive  capacity  of  society  has 
so  increased  that,  with  proper  adjustment  of  work 
and  equitable  distribution  of  the  products  of  labor, 
hunger  and  famine  need  no  longer  be  feared  by  the 
masses  in  Western  countries.  Unfortunately,  as 
hunger  and  famine  retire  into  the  background,  a 
new  menace — sex  and  class  parasitism  on  a  whole- 
sale scale — confronts  society.  In  the  case  of  in- 
ferior animals,  as  well  as  in  the  case  of  human 
beings,  the  strong,  true,  normal  mother  has  ever 
been  a  worker.  Idleness  begets  degeneracy  in 
woman  as  well  as  in  man,  and  the  idleness  of  the 
woman  is  the  more  dangerous  to  the  welfare  of 
the  race.  "Other  causes  may,  and  do,  lead  to  the 
enervation  and  the  degeneration  of  a  race;  the 
io6 


WOMAN    AND    INDUSTRY 

parasitism  of  its  child-bearing  women  must."^  In 
short,  working  women,  not  women  of  leisure,  have 
normal  instincts.  Only  working  women  can  be 
the  mothers  of  a  strong  and  vigorous  race.  "Our 
problem  is  so  to  adapt  the  world  to  the  woman  who 
works  that  she  may  combine  motherhood  with  in- 
dustry,"^  The  crux  of  the  "woman  problem"  and 
one  important  factor  in  the  question  of  "race 
suicide"  lies  wrapped  up  with  the  contraction  of 
the  sphere  of  woman's  work.  The  outward  ex- 
pression of  parasitism  among  the  well-to-do  of  the 
present  eri  is  found  in  such  phenomena  as  bridge 
whist  parties,  sensational  banquets,  automobile 
races,  l;iorse  shows  and  various  other  forms  of  dis- 
sipation and  lust;  or  in  the  case  of  those  only 
partially  on  the  road  toward  parasitism,  expression 
is  found  in  some  form  of  intellectual  or  manual 
"make-work,"  or  in  the  needless  complication  of 
relatively  simple  duties.  The  vital  evils  are,  how- 
ever, deeply  hidden,  and  manifest  themselves  more 
slowly  in  point  of  time. 

Woman,  herself,  is  not  oblivious  to  the  danger  of 
her  position.  She  has  given  voice  to  the  cry: 
"Give  us  work,  or  we  perish."  "We  demand  that 
in  that  new  strange  world  which  is  arising  alike 
upon  men  and  women,  where  nothing  is  as  it  was, 
and  all  things  are  assuming  new  shapes  and  rela- 
tions, we  demand  that  in  this  new  world  we  also 
shall  have  our  share  of  honored  and  socially  useful 

*  Olive  Schreiner,  Cosmopolitan,  Vol.  28  :  192.  See  also 
Parsons,  The  Family,  pp.  346-7,  354. 

'  Commander,  The  American  Idea,  p.  268. 
107 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

human  toil,  our  half  of  the  labor  of  the  children  of 
woman."^  Economic  considerations  and  the  neces- 
sities of  racial  progress  demand  that  woman  con- 
tinue, but  under  new  conditions,  to  be  an  industrial 
worker.  One  of  the  most  important  functions  of 
education  in  the  decades  which  lie  just  ahead  will 
be  to  aid  in  adjustirg  industrial  affairs  so  that 
industrial  or  professional  activity  may  not  be  in- 
imical to  motherhood. 

*  Schreiner,   Cosmopolitan,  Vol.   28  154. 


108 


CHAPTER   VI 
EDUCATION   OF  WOMEN 

The  home  and  the  school  are  two  great  bulwarks 
which  have  safeguarded  Occidental  civilization  and 
culture.  Other  institutions  have  indeed  made 
valuable  contributions,  but  to  the  home  and  the 
school  we  are  indebted  for  the  noblest  fruits  of 
Western  development.  Although  we  may  revere 
and  honor  either  or  both,  it  must  not  be  forgotten 
or  overlooked  that  these  words  do  not  stand  for 
fixed  and  unyielding  concepts;  these  two  institu- 
tions are  ever  in  a  state  of  mobility  and  fluxion. 
As  the  years  pass  by,  all  industrial  and  social  in- 
stitutions undergo  constant  change;  the  relative 
importance  and  value  of  this  function  of  one  in- 
creases, while  that  function  of  another  decreases. 
A  readjustment  is  necessary  in  order  to  meet  the 
new  situation  satisfactorily.  Progress  is  change — 
growth  on  the  one  hand,  decay  on  the  other.  New 
functions  and  duties  devolve  upon  certain  social 
institutions,  and  some  of  the  old  functions  are 
gradually  transferred  from  one  institution  to  an- 
other. New  inventions,  new  methods  of  rapid 
transportation,  increased  trade,  the  growth  of  cities, 
have  changed  radically  and  almost  fundamentally 
the  relations  existing  between  the  home  and  the 
109 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

school.  Just  as  the  factory  has  borrowed  many 
of  the  functions  formerly  exercised  by  the  home, 
so  on  the  other  hand  has  the  school  assumed  many 
of  the  duties  which  once  devolved  upon  the  home. 
Boys  and  girls  grow  to  manhood  and  woman- 
hood under  the  guiding  and  dominating  influence 
of  three  important  and,  in  a  large  measure,  distinct 
social  mstitutions — the  home,  the  school  and  the 
playground.  These  institutions  are  chiefly  respon- 
sible to  society  for  the  growth  and  proper  mental, 
moral  and  physical  development  of  the  child.  Each 
has  its  own  distinct  duties  and  functions,  but  the 
division  is  not  fixed  and  invariable,  nor  is  the  line 
of  demarkation  between  the  special  fields  of  each 
always  easy  to  draw.  To-day's  demands  upon  each 
are  different  from  those  of  yesterday^  and  the 
future  requirements  will  not  be  identical  with  those 
of  to-day.  The  nature  and  character  of  school 
work  and  home  duties  are  in  a  state  of  evolution  and 
of  rapid  adjustment  to  unique  conditions  and  un- 
usual situations,  which  are  the  result  of  recent  social 
and  industrial  changes  and  progress.  In  past  gen- 
erations the  influence  of  the  home  overshadowed 
that  of  the  remaining  two  institutions.  In  the  home 
the  child  received  the  major  part  of  his  training  for 
his  after  life.  The  home  produced  and  prepared 
nearly  all  the  food  consumed  by  the  members  of  the 
family;  much  of  the  work  which  is  now  carried  on 
in  the  factory  was  then  performed  in  the  home. 
It  was  the  scene  of  diversified  industry  as  well  as 
the  center  of  the  child's  social  life;  in  contrast,  the 
school  was  merely  the  place  where  the  famous  three 
no 


EDUCATION    OF    WOMEN 

R's  were  expounded  to  the  unwilling  youth;  the 
playground  was  broad  and  spacious,  often  consist- 
ing of  an  entire  farm.  This  rural  playground  was, 
to  a  considerable  extent,  under  the  watchful  eye  of 
the  parents ;  the  opportunity  for  mischief  and  the 
danger  from  immoral  influences  were  reduced  far 
below  those  offered  by  the  city  street  or  alley. 
The  disappearance  of  the  playground  and  the  loss 
of  many  forms  of  industry  are  two  of  the  chief 
causes  of  the  educational  inefficiency  of  the  city 
home  of  to-day  as  contrasted  with  the  rural  home 
of  one  or  two  generations  ago. 

The  industrial  transformations  which  have  al- 
ready been  considered  are  visibly  affecting  the 
influence  of  the  home  upon  the  child.  Indeed,  in 
many  of  the  poorer  homes  of  the  cities  where  both 
father  and  mother  are  wage-earners,  the  function 
of  the  home  has  been  reduced  practically  to  that  of 
a  mere  eating  and  sleeping  place.  Amusement, 
social  intercourse,  the  meeting  with  friends,  all 
those  happy  associations  which  usually  cluster 
around  the  concept  of  home  are  transferred  to  the 
public  meeting  place,  the  theater,  the  summer  gar- 
den, the  saloon,  the  club,  the  street  corner  and  the 
dance  hall.  Such  conditions  are  undoubtedly  ab- 
normal, and  do  not  represent  the  true  line  of  prog- 
ress ;  nevertheless,  it  is  a  fact  that  in  the  future  the 
child  will  be  more  and  more  given  into  the  hands 
of  the  trained  nurse,  the  skilled  kindergartner,  the 
playground  director  and  the  teachers  of  academic 
studies  and  of  manual  training.  Whether  the  home 
be  good  or  bad,  the  child  of  the  future  must,  in  a 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

larger  measure  than  did  the  child  of  former  gen- 
erations, come  under  the  influence  of  specialists 
and  experts  who  are  not  members  of  his  family; 
and  the  child  is  more  and  more  to  be  called  beyond 
the  walls  of  his  home.  The  recent  changes  in  the 
scope  and  functions  of  the  school  point  in  this 
direction.  In  the  case  of  the  "undesirable"  home, 
it  is  now  generally  admitted  that  there  are  excellent 
reasons  for  the  substitution  of  school  for  home 
influence ;  but  if  the  mother  is  to  spend  more  of  her 
time  outside  the  home,  if  she  is  to  be  identified  with 
interests  which  are  not  of  the  household,  the  school 
must  stand  ready  to  assist  in  a  larger  measure  in 
the  care  and  training  of  the  children  from  all  homes, 
good,  bad  or  indifferent.  As  a  direct  result  of  the 
decrease  in  the  functions  of  the  home  and  the 
changing  status  of  women,  the  scope  of  school  work 
is  being  gradually  extended.  On  the  other  hand, 
our  educational  and  industrial  life  has  become  so 
complex  that  few  mothers  are  capable  of  assuming 
entire  charge  of  the  care  and  training  of  the  child. 
The  education  and  training  of  children,  like  the 
manufacture  of  delicate  and  intricate  pieces  of 
mechanism,  demand  the  work  and  energy  of  skilled 
workers  in  special  lines. 

The  belief,  so  prevalent,  that  the  home  is  always 
the  best  place  for  young  children  to  be,  and  that 
they  should  be  under  its  influence  as  much  as  pos- 
sible, is  unfortunately  not  always  warranted  by  the 
facts.  Many  parents  have  no  conception  of  the 
conditions  which  are  necessary  for  the  intellectual, 
moral   and  physical   well-being   of   children.     The 


EDUCATION    OF    WOMEN 

influence  of  many  homes  is  vicious,  degrading  and, 
in  some  cases,  immoral.  In  so  far  as  it  is  possible 
to  remove  the  young  from  such  an  atmosphere,  and 
to  substitute  a  better  environment,  to  that  extent  is 
the  moral  and  ethical  advancement  of  society  aided. 
The  rights  of  the  family  are  not  so  sacred  and  in- 
violable as  many  persons  stoutly  maintain.  Society 
has  the  right,  and  it  is  its  duty,  to  demand  such 
conditions  in  the  home  as  will  give  the  young 
opportunity  for  healthy  development,  both  morally 
and  physically.  No  plea  for  the  rights  and  integrity 
of  the  family  should  be  allowed  to  befog  the  issue. 
The  rights  of  society  are  paramount  and  take  pre- 
cedence over  those  of  any  social  or  governmental 
institution.  This  is  the  lesson  which  modern  in- 
dustrial and  social  progress  is  teaching  us. 

As  long  as  homes  exist  which  are  not  desirable 
living  places  for  the  young  child,  society  ought  to 
protect  itself  by  taking  the  child  wholly  or  partially 
from  the  care  of  the  parents  forming  that  home. 
Care  must  be  taken  to  prevent  parents  from  feeling 
that  all  the  responsibility  for  the  welfare  of  the 
child  is  taken  from  their  shoulders.  There  is  a 
tendency,  however,  to  exaggerate  the  dangers  of 
paternalism  of  this  sort.  Fears  are  expressed  which 
sound  very  similar  to  those  manifested  at  an  earlier 
period  against  tax-supported  public  schools.  For 
example.  Dr.  Wayland  in  his  Political  Economy 
(1837)  argues  that  the  expenses  of  the  public 
schools  may  be  provided  "partly  by  a  general  fund ; 
this  fund  should,  however,  never  defray  more  than 
a  portion  of  the  expense,  for  no  man  values  highly 
8  113 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

what  he  gets  for  nothing."  The  free  public  school 
has,  nevertheless,  won  a  firm  foothold,  and  free 
text-books  are  being  accepted  as  a  matter  of  course. 
May  not  further  steps  in  the  same  general  direction 
be  also  attended  by  good  results  ?  But  severe  social 
condemnation  should  be  visited  upon  parents  who 
bring  children  into  the  world  for  whom  they  mani- 
festly will  be  unable  to  provide  properly. 

The  parental  school  teaches  educators  a  valuable 
lesson.  The  school  of  the  future  will  certainly  use 
some  of  the  methods  and  mechanism  of  this  institu- 
tion. The  parental  school  is  designed  to  take  the 
place  of  the  home  in  cases  where  the  latter  is  de- 
ficient in  the  qualities  which  are  requisite  for  a 
good  home.  Work,  physical  exercise  and  drills, 
play,  and  the  ordinary  school  routine  enter  into  the 
curriculum  at  these  schools.  The  child  is  kept  at 
the  school  day  and  night  under  the  care  of  com- 
petent instructors.  It  becomes  temporarily  the 
home  of  the  pupil.  In  the  future,  borrowing  some 
of  the  features  of  the  parental  school,  the  regular 
public  school  will  probably  take  the  child  from 
morning  until  the  latter  part  of  the  afternoon. 
Noon  meals  will  be  served,  and  the  study  periods 
will  be  interspersed  with  work  and  play  appropriate 
to  the  grade  and  age  of  the  child.  The  school  will 
become  a  workshop  and  a  playground  as  well  as  a 
place  for  study  and  reading  of  books.  The  book 
will  be  considered  to  be  a  workshop  aid,  and  will  be 
used  when  the  child  in  his  conflict  with  various 
obstacles  sees  the  necessity  for  it.  The  book  is 
only  a  tool,  a  means  to  an  end,  and  is  effectively 
114 


EDUCATION    OF    WOMEN 

used  only  when  the  child  realizes  the  need  of  it. 
The  book  represents  experience  received  second- 
hand. In  order  to  assimilate  its  contents  thoroughly 
and  completely,  first-hand  actual  experience  and 
contact  with  materials  must  be  allowed. 

These  changes  will  not  be  worked  out  in  a  day 
or  a  year;  but  slowly  and  surely  the  school  is  add- 
ing to  its  functions  and  broadening  its  scope.  If 
woman  is  to  engage  in  industrial  pursuits,  or  to 
participate  in  the  educational  and  political  move- 
ments and  agitations  of  the  day,  she  must  neglect 
or  be  relieved  of  many  of  her  household  cares  and 
duties.  The  public  school  is  the  one  institution 
which  can  be  utilized  to  care  properly  for  the  chil- 
dren during  the  daytime.  The  training  and  care 
received  by  young  children  from  expert  kinder- 
gartners  and  primary  teachers  is  superior  to  that 
which  the  average  mother  can  give,  and  infinitely 
better  than  that  usually  received  from  the  household 
servants,  or  the  older  brother  or  sister.  Ignorance 
on  the  part  of  even  a  few  is  expensive  to  the  com- 
munity. The  most  important  work  of  the  school 
should  be  that  of  compensating  for  the  weakness 
and  inefficiency  of  the  home  as  a  training  school  for 
the  young,  or  that  of  counteracting  its  maleficent 
influence.  The  growing  educational  importance  of 
the  school,  as  compared  with  the  home,  points  to- 
ward a  wider  diffusion  of  knowledge  and  toward 
greater  equality  in  education  and  culture.  Homes 
are  greatly  dissimilar  as  to  internal  and  external 
environment,  and  home  training  is  consequently  of 
very  different  quality  and  characteristics.  The 
"5 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

school — any  one  particular  school — offers  a  prac- 
tically uniform  set  of  conditions  for  all  pupils.  As 
the  influence  of  the  public  school  increases  and  is 
extended  to  all  children,  the  artificial  inequality 
among  men  is  reduced.  A  distinction  must  be 
drawn  between  natural  and  artificial  inequality. 
The  variation  in  human  ability  is  much  greater  at 
present  than  would  result  solely  from  natural  in- 
equality, and  is  the  result  of  unequal  diffusion  of 
knowledge  and  of  unequal  economic  opportunity. 
The  great  differentiation  between  men  of  the  same 
race  and  nationality  is  chiefly  one  of  environment, 
of  circumstances  which  need  not  be  referred  back 
to  the  distant  past.  In  so  far  as  useful  instruction 
and  training — mental,  physical  and  industrial — is 
extended  to  all,  will  exploitation  of  the  poor  by  the 
rich,  the  uneducated  by  the  educated,  the  mass  by 
the  few,  be  decreased  and  made  difficult. 

Women  are  to  play  an  important  role  in  de- 
termining the  trend  of  education  in  the  future. 
They  are  to  influence  and  modify  educational  aims 
and  methods;  they  will  do  much  to  fix  the  value 
and  determine  the  scope  of  the  work  of  the  public 
school.  But  the  woman  whose  time  is  entirely 
occupied  with  household  cares  and  duties  cannot 
enter  upon  the  broader  field  of  work  and  activity 
which  many  of  her  enthusiastic  sisters  are  prophesy- 
ing for  their  sex.  If  the  great  mass  of  women  are 
to  take  their  place  beside  men  in  the  industrial,  pro- 
fessional or  educational  world,  more  of  their  home 
duties,  educational  and  otherwise,  must  be  turned 
over  to  specialists,  who  will  perform  the  work  out- 
ii6 


EDUCATION    OF    WOMEN 

side  the  home  or  come  to  it  at  stated  intervals. 
There  is  no  other  probable  solution;  the  maid-of- 
all-work  is  an  anomaly,  a  survival,  in  the  industrial 
field. 

The  enhanced  importance  of  the  school  in  the 
education  of  men  and  women  may,  therefore,  be 
expected  to  produce  two  distinct  and  important 
results.  First,  it  partially  removes  one  of  the  most 
difficult  barriers  which  has  long  obstructed  the  up- 
ward path  for  the  female  sex.  Secondly,  it  tends 
to  produce  a  more  uniform  diffusion  of  knowledge, 
a  greater  equality  in  environmental  conditions,  and 
as  a  result  a  more  equitable  distribution  of  oppor- 
tunity. Woman,  in  urging  the  introduction  of  the 
so-called  educational  "fads,"  is  building  even  better 
than  she  anticipated.  Education — the  wide  dif- 
fusion of  accumulated  knowledge  and  experience 
— is  a  lubricant  which  diminishes  the  friction  in 
social  adjustments  to  new  environmental  conditions. 

It  must  not,  however,  be  forgotten  that  although 
the  home  is  losing  many  of  its  former  functions, 
although  the  mother  is  called  out  of  the  home  for  a 
portion  of  each  day,  there  is  no  valid  reason  for 
believing  that  the  home  will  not  continue  to  be  the 
greatest  and  most  basal  of  all  American  institutions. 
The  care  of  the  children  during  a  portion  of  the 
day,  the  choice  of  their  diet  and  clothing,  the  duty 
of  making  the  home  comfortable,  pleasant,  inviting 
and  healthful  must  still  devolve  in  some  measure 
upon  the  wife  and  mother.  Although  in  the  future  a 
considerable  portion  of  what  was  the  household 
work  in  the  past  will  be  performed  by  specialists, 
117 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

the  mother's  training  for  the  management  of  a 
household,  judged  in  the  light  of  to-day's  experi- 
ence, will  ever  remain  an  important  factor  in  the 
development  of  the  young. 

The  chief  reasons  for  the  diminished  educational 
value  of  the  home  may  be  summarized  under  three 
heads,  (i)  The  industrial  functions  of  the  home 
are  gradually  disappearing.  (2)  The  play  space  in 
the  immediate  vicinity  of  the  city  home,  and  which 
is  under  the  direct  supervision  of  the  mother,  has 
been  greatly  reduced  or  has  entirely  disappeared. 
(3)  Industrial  changes  are  affecting  the  status  of 
woman ;  she  is  losing  her  position  as  a  housekeeper. 
The  tendency  is  to  drive  her  out  of  the  home  into 
industrial  or  professional  pursuits,  or  to  convert 
her  into  an  idler.  In  either  case  the  importance  of 
the  mother  as  an  educator  is  diminished.  If  the 
mother  is  an  idler,  she  is  living  an  abnormal  life, 
and  her  influence  is  not  of  the  proper  kind.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  time  of  the  working  mother  is  occu- 
pied in  attending  to  many  duties  not  pertaining  to, 
and  usually  conflicting  with,  the  care  and  training 
of  children. 

The  above  considerations  make  it  evident  that 
the  problem  which  confronts  the  school  during  the 
present  period  of  transition  is  an  unusual  and  a 
peculiarly  difficult  one.  The  education  of  the  girl 
presents  a  double  task  during  the  period  of  adjust- 
ment to  city  environment  and  to  new  industrial 
methods.  The  girl  must  be  prepared  to  be  a 
home  maker  in  the  old  sense  of  the  term,  and  also 
an  industrial  worker;  she  must  be  fitted  for  the 
118 


EDUCATION    OF    WOMEN 

traditional  sphere  of  woman  with  its  multiplicity  of 
duties,  and  also  for  earning  a  livelihood  in  com- 
petition with  men  in  the  industrial,  commercial  and 
professional  world.  A  woman  ought  to  know  how 
to  cook  and  to  sew,  she  should  understand  the  rela- 
tive nutritive  values  of  different  foods  and  be 
familiar  with  the  elementary  principles  of  household 
sanitation  and  home  decoration,  and  she  ought  to  be 
able  to  properly  care  for  her  children.  On  the 
other  hand,  a  woman  should  be  able  to  support 
herself  outside  the  home,  if  occasion  demands  it. 
Many  will  not  give  assent  to  the  last  proposition; 
but  do  such  persons  look  the  matter  squarely  in  the 
face?  Do  they  not  take  refuge  in  an  appeal  to  the 
past?  In  the  future  all  women  may  become  wage 
earners,  but  this  is  a  contingent  which  will  not  arise 
at  least  m  the  immediate  future.  Cooking,  for 
example,  may  at  some  future  time  be  done  entirely 
outside  the  home  by  well-trained  experts;  but  until 
that  time  comes  the  wife  and  mother  should  be 
prepared  to  undertake  the  feeding  of  the  household. 
Indeed,  training  in  domestic  science  and  in  the  care 
of  a  home  are  to-day  even  more  important  than  in 
the  past,  because  the  stamina  and  vigor  of  a  race  of 
city  dwellers  are  dependent  in  such  a  large  measure 
upon  proper  diet  and  proper  ventilation  of  homes, 
schools  and  workshops.  The  natural  conditions 
surrounding  the  child  living  in  a  rural  district  are 
more  healthful  than  the  artificial  environment  of 
the  city.  The  improperly  nourished  and  ill-cared- 
for  child  of  the  country  has  a  better  opportunity 
for  health  and  strength  than  one  correspondingly 
iig 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

neglected  in  the  city,  although  both  are  seriously 
handicapped. 

The  discussion  of  the  proper  preparation  for 
earning  a  living  need  not  be  entered  into  at  this 
point.  If  women  enter  into  industrial  and  profes- 
sional life,  and  work  beside  men,  this  portion  of 
their  training  must,  of  necessity,  approximate  that 
of  men.  What  especially  concerns  us  now  is  to 
show  the  vital  importance  of  training  for  home 
making,  and  to  emphasize  the  economic  and  social 
importance,  at  the  present  time,  of  domestic  science 
in  the  public  schools  of  this  country. 

It  has  often  been  asserted,  by  those  familiar  with 
the  condition  and  manner  of  living  of  the  poor, 
that  the  latter  live  upon  food  which  is  badly  cooked, 
poorly  served,  not  wisely  selected  and  of  little 
variety.  The  vast  majority  of  the  people  of  this 
progressive  country  have  little  knowledge  of  the 
value  of  food  stuffs  or  of  the  importance  of  a 
well-chosen  diet.  There  is  more  than  a  modicum 
of  truth  in  the  adage  which  certain  makers  of  break- 
fast foods  are  fond  of  quoting:  "Tell  me  what  you 
eat  and  I  will  tell  you  what  you  are."  Diet  is  one 
of  the  great  factors  in  determining  the  growth  and 
development  of  the  child.  In  the  past,  however, 
little  thought  has  been  given  to  the  feeding  of  the 
human  animal.  Our  cooks  have  not  been  experts; 
they  have  known  little  or  nothing  of  the  proper 
combinations  of  food,  of  the  nutritive  value  of  cer- 
tain foods,  or  of  the  proper  methods  of  preparing 
and  of  serving  foods.  When  man  lived  an  out- 
door life  almost  exclusively,  this  was  not  of  as  much 


EDUCATION    OF    WOMEN 

consequence  as  it  is  when  he  leads  a  more  sedentary- 
life,  as  it  is  since  he  is  confined  the  major  portion 
of  the  day  within  four  walls.  Dyspepsia,  Bright's 
disease  and  other  modern  ills  are  the  penalties  for 
non-adjustment  and  non-conformity  to  the  require- 
ments of  modern  city  life.  But  more  vital  and 
dangerous  to  society  are  the  consequent  stunting 
and  weakening  of  the  child.  Improper  food  and 
diet  make  the  weakling,  the  degenerate  and  the 
inefficient. 

An  elementary  knowledge  of  cooking,  sewing, 
household  sanitation,  the  keeping  of  household  ac- 
counts, the  decoration  and  care  of  the  home,  should 
be  given  to  all  the  girls  in  our  ward  schools.  If 
we  wait  until  the  high  school  is  reached  we  fail  to 
give  this  training  to  a  large  percentage  of  those 
whose  home  training  in  these  arts  is  little  or  none. 
Domestic  science,  or  household  economics,  in  the  col- 
lege is  good,  domestic  science  and  art  in  the  high 
school  are  better,  but  cooking,  sewing,  sanitation 
and  household  art  in  the  elementary  and  night 
schools  are  best, — these  are  essential  to  the  improve- 
ment of  the  home  of  the  next  generation.  This 
fact  should  be  proclaimed  by  every  woman's  club, 
by  every  teacher's  association,  and  by  every  organi- 
zation devoted  to  the  social,  educational  and  eco- 
nomic advancement  of  the  poorer  classes.  There  is 
little  danger  of  placing  too  much  emphasis  upon 
this  point. 

The  position  of  a  woman  in  charge  of  the  home 
is  one  which  is  extremely  potent  for  good  or  for 
evil.     The  physical  and  moral  welfare  of  each  child 

121 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

is,  now  as  in  the  past,  largely  determined  by  the 
mother,  and  therefore  the  future  of  the  race  is  to  a 
c»nsiderable  degree  in  the  keeping  of  the  female  sex. 
Improper  food  and  squalid  and  uninviting  home 
environment  are  among  the  chief  supports  of  the 
brewery  and  the  saloon.  Real,  effective  temperance 
work  begins  at  this  point.  Improvement  in  home 
conditions  and  provision  for  social  meetings  and 
enjoyment  in  wholesome  and  inviting  surroundings 
will  strike  deadly  blows  at  the  great  evil  of  in- 
temperance. Dr.  Corwin,  in  charge  of  the  welfare 
work  of  the  Colorado  Fuel  and  Iron  Company,  has 
made  this  significant  statement:  "To  a  hungry 
man  a  home's  attractiveness  begins  at  the  table. 
But  if  he  come  home  to  a  supper  of  tasteless,  indi- 
gestible food,  served  without  any  attempt  at  making 
it  inviting  or  the  table  attractive,  is  there  any  won- 
der that  he  seeks  the  saloon  for  stimulants?"  The 
work  of  the  school  should  render  efficient  service 
in  the  prevention  of  both  physical  and  moral  disease. 
The  high  price  of  food  is  partially  the  result 
of  a  demand  for,  and  the  consumption  of,  more 
food  than  is  needed  to  maintain  health  and  vigor; 
it  is  also  in  a  measure  due  to  wasteful  and  im- 
proper, or  partial,  utilization  of  food  stuffs.  Con- 
sumption in  a  given  country  or  locality  should  be 
so  adjusted  and  proportioned  as  to  utilize,  where 
possible,  those  goods  which  may  be  produced  at 
least  expense.  "Many  times  the  amount  of  food 
might  be  obtained,  with  no  increase  of  proportional 
cost,  if  the  people  would  be  content  with  a  diet 
containing  the  different  articles  of  food   in  that 

122 


EDUCATION    OF    WOMEN 

proportion  which  will  allow  the  land  to  be  employed 
in  the  production  of  those  commodities  for  which 
it  is  best  fitted."^  A  more  economic  consumption 
would  decrease  the  relative  proportion  of  workers 
engaged  in  producing  the  necessities  of  life,  thus 
enabling  a  greater  amount  of  the  comforts  of  life  to 
be  produced, — a  potent  factor  in  raising  the  stand- 
ard of  well-being. 

A  scientific  knowledge  of  the  nutritive  value  of 
different  foods  would  enable  consumers  to  find  and 
to  use  proper  substitutes  for  a  food,  as  for  example 
meat,  the  price  of  which  has  suddenly  been  raised. 
If  such  knowledge  was  general  throughout  the 
country,  the  consumer  would  be  able  to  prevent  or 
at  least  to  check  arbitrary  and  unreasonable  changes 
in  the  price  of  many  food  stuffs. 

Education  and  economics  enter  their  protests 
against  the  useless  frittering  away  of  woman's  life 
in  a  foolish  and  senseless  round  of  so-called  social 
duties,  in  making  extraordinary  quantities  of  "fancy 
work,"  or  in  the  performance  of  duties  which  could 
be  better  attended  to  by  specialists  outside  the 
home.  Education  is  no  longer  to  be  considered  an 
end  in  itself.  Art  for  art's  sake,  culture  for  cul- 
ture's sake,  and  education  for  the  sake  of  an  edu- 
cation are  ideals  which  ought  to  be  forever  relegated 
to  the  rear.  Education  is  a  means  to  an  end,  it  is 
a  tool ;  it  better  prepares  the  raw  material  entrusted 
to  its  care  for  the  duties  which  will  devolve  upon 
each  bit  of  human  material.  To  earn  a  living  and 
properly  to  perform  the  duties  of  parenthood  are 

*  Patten,  Premises  of  Political  Economy,  p.  62. 
123 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

important  obligations  which  will  devolve  upon  a 
large  percentage  of  those  now  in  school.  Can  we 
afford  to  overlook  the  practical  things  of  life  when 
preparing  our  school  curriculum?  Whatever  may 
be  the  verdict  as  to  many  of  Herbert  Spencer's 
educational  theories,  certainly  all  must  admit  that 
he  did  a  commendable  and  valuable  service  in  em- 
phasizing the  value  of  the  practical  things  with 
which  education  should  deal.  Surely,  if  it  is  worth 
while  to  prepare,  publish  and  spread  broadcast 
bulletins  regarding  the  proper  treatment  and  care  of 
cattle  and  hogs,  it  is  also  worth  while  to  devote  some 
time  and  attention  to  the  needs  of  the  growing 
child.  One  of  the  most  fruitful  and  ever-present 
sources  of  depravity  and  crime  is  the  improper 
nourishment  and  care  of  children;  and  this  is 
chiefly  the  result  of  ignorance.  Which  is  likely  to 
be  of  the  greatest  value  to  the  average  man  or 
woman, — to  be  able  to  analyze  a  sentence,  or  to 
determine  in  an  approximate  way  the  value  of  dif- 
ferent food  materials?  Is  it  better  to  be  able  to 
read  Latin,  or  to  understand  how  to  breathe  deeply 
and  correctly?  Is  it  better  to  be  able  to  bound 
China,  or  to  drive  a  nail?  The  notion  that  an  edu- 
cated man  or  woman  should  do  no  useful  work, 
manual  or  otherwise,  is  out  of  date  and  pernicious. 
Education  should  aim  to  produce  the  useful,  ener- 
getic manual  or  mental  worker,  no  matter  whether 
the  student  be  male  or  female. 

The  young  women  of  to-day  are  developing  in 
an   atmosphere  which   is   radically   different   from 
that  which  enveloped  the  early  years  of  their  grand- 
124 


EDUCATION    OF    WOMEN 

mothers.  Their  point  of  view  regarding  their  own 
work  and  position  in  the  economic  and  industrial 
world  will  inevitably  be  greatly  modified  by  the 
change.  Professor  Patten  has  told  us  that  "the 
city  home  of  the  future  will  be  built  by  two  who 
are  educated,  side  by  side,  in  the  public  school, 
whose  industrial  careers  are  side  by  side  in  the 
factory,  whose  plans  of  life,  formed  by  the  same 
city  outlook,  have  resulted  in  like  powers  and 
parallel  interests."  The  concept  of  wide  and  irre- 
movable differences  in  the  qualifications  and  abili- 
ties of  the  two  sexes  in  the  intellectual  and  industrial 
world  will  disappear  in  the  light  of  these  new 
relationships. 

The  proper  education  of  girls  is  one  of  the  most 
important  problems  connected  with  the  improve- 
ment of  conditions  in  the  crowded  industrial  centers 
of  our  country.  The  need  here  is  especially  great 
and  important.  Girls  have  entered  our  school  sys- 
tem and  have  followed  the  curriculum  devised  for 
the  boys.  In  the  upper  grammar  grades  and  in  the 
high  school  their  work  should  be  different  in  many 
respects  from  that  of  the  boys.  On  the  other  hand, 
a  cultural  training,  while  important  and  desirable, 
is  not,  or  should  not  be,  the  chief  aim  of  the  teacher 
of  girls.  Under  the  now  existing  circumstances, 
the  duties  of  the  husband  take  him  outside  the 
family  circle  for  the  greater  portion  of  each  day,  on 
him  now  falls  as  a  rule  the  entire  burden  of  furnish- 
ing the  necessities  and  comforts  of  the  home;  the 
duties  of  the  wife  still  keep  her  within  the  home  to 
a  greater  extent,  on  her  still  rests  a  portion  at  least 

125 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

of  the  burden  of  preparing  the  food  and  clothes, 
and  of  caring  for  the  household.  As  long  as  these 
facts  remain  nothing  can  so  ennoble  womanhood  as 
a  thorough  study  and  preparation  for  the  duties  of 
home  making.  Such  training  ought  not  to  be  over- 
looked in  order  to  give  the  girl  a  knowledge  of 
literature,  languages,  civil  government,  or  a  prep- 
aration for  earning  a  livelihood.  But,  on  the  other 
hand,  ability  to  earn  a  livelihood  and  actual  entrance 
into  the  industrial  world  will  also  do  much  to  exalt 
womanhood  and  to  place  woman  upon  a  high  plane, 
to  make  her  independent  of  the  whims  and  caprices 
of  the  other  sex.  And,  if  the  analysis  of  social 
progress  presented  in  the  preceding  pages  is  accu- 
rate, training  for  industrial  and  professional  pur- 
suits will,  as  the  years  go  by,  occupy  an  increasingly 
important  place  in  the  educational  program  for 
young  ladies. 


126 


CHAPTER   VII 

THE   INDUSTRIAL   AND    EDUCATIONAL   VALUE 

OF   MANUAL  TRAINING  AND   LABORATORY 

WORK 

The  introduction  of  manual  training  and  labora- 
tory work  into  the  public-school  system  as  a  per- 
manent and  valued  part  of  its  curriculum  is  one 
of  the  first  and  one  of  the  most  significant  features 
of  the  recent  era  of  educational  advance.  The 
parallel  between  this  era  and  the  earlier  one  is 
striking.  In  each  case  a  war  was  followed  by  rapid 
industrial  progress  and  wild  speculation,  leading 
to  a  severe  industrial  depression.  This  crisis  was, 
in  each  period,  followed,  as  has  been  previously 
mentioned,  by  the  rapid  growth  of  labor  organiza- 
tions, the  spread  of  propaganda  of  various  sorts, 
and  by  a  vigorous  agitation  in  favor  of  public  edu- 
cation. The  introduction  of  manual  training  and 
of  laboratory  work  definitely  marks  an  important 
modification  in  the  conception  of  the  purpose  and 
methods  of  school  instruction,  and  is  the  visible 
manifestation  of  the  influence  of  important  changes 
in  industrial  methods  and  social  conditions.  The 
laboratory  and  the  manual-training  school  are 
not  content  with  mere  passive  receptivity  on  the 
part  of  the  student,  but  require  self-activity  and 
127 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

constructive  work.  The  introduction  of  these  two 
educational  accessories  indicates  to  the  student  of 
educational  progress  that  the  home  had,  by  that 
time,  lost  much  of  its  industrial  character,  and  that 
division  of  labor  was  then  an  important  factor  in 
the  industrial  world.  At  that  time  the  school  passed 
from  the  old  to  the  new  concept  of  its  duties ;  edu- 
cation then  became  more  than  mere  intellectual 
gymnastics  and  memory  drill.  Mere  passive  recep- 
tion of  the  words  and  ideas  of  teacher  and  text- 
book was  then  necessarily  replaced,  in  some  degree, 
by  personal  observation,  judgment,  manual  skill 
and  actual  contact  with  materials  and  apparatus. 
The  use  by  the  teacher  of  apparatus  to  demonstrate 
the  laws  presented  in  the  text-book  or  in  the  lecture 
marked  a  long  step  forward ;  but  the  actual  placing 
of  that  apparatus  in  the  hands  of  the  pupil  was  still 
more  important.  The  value  of  this  kind  of  experi- 
ence and  training  may  be  considered  from  two,  not 
necessarily  conflicting,  points  of  view, — educational 
and  industrial.  What  is  its  value  as  a  training 
leading  to  a  well-rounded  character  and  intellect; 
and  what  is  its  value  in  training  up  a  body  of 
efficient  workers  in  all  kinds  and  grades  of  indus- 
trial work? 

As  has  been  observed  in  preceding  chapters,  in 
earlier  generations  the  need  of  the  kind  of  training 
which  these  two  features  of  our  modern  curriculum 
impart  was  small,  and  moreover  it  could  be  ob- 
tained outside  the  school.  Only  recently  have  ac- 
curate quantitative  and  qualitative  methods  of 
measurement  been  introduced  into  all  industrial 
128 


VALUE    OF    MANUAL    TRAINING 

processes.  Interchangeable  parts  of  machinery  re- 
quire that  two  pieces  be  almost  identical.  The 
variation  of  the  fraction  of  the  hundredth  or  even 
of  the  thousandth  of  an  inch  will  often  render  a 
piece  worthless.  The  chemist,  the  physicist  and  the 
engineer  are  now  indispensable  in  the  industrial 
world.  If  the  home  still  offered  the  same  oppor- 
tunities for  training  in  manual  work,  and  if  it  still 
afforded  the  same  chance  for  contact  with  materials 
as  it  did  under  more  primitive  conditions,  such 
training  would  nevertheless  be  clearly  inadequate  to 
meet  the  present  requirements,  as  our  skilled 
workers  and  engineers  require  training  in  accuracy. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  work  in  our  shops  has 
become  so  specialized  that  a  boy  from  the  time  of 
his  entrance  is  forced  into  a  rigid  and  monotonous 
routine,  usually  that  of  tending  automatic  or  semi- 
automatic machines.  He  is  able  to  observe  or  learn 
little  beyond  the  few  simple  operations  required  of 
him.  As  a  consequence  he  soon  gets  into  a  rut,  and 
is  unable  to  change  readily  to  another  kind  of  work 
unless  it  is  of  a  similar  routine  character.  It  is  this 
unreasoning,  uncomprehending  boy  who  becomes 
the  inefficient  and  unreliable  workman.  Appren- 
tices are  given  better  opportunities,  it  is  true,  but 
only  a  limited  number  of  engineering  establish- 
ments receive  apprentices. 

The  value  of  the  home  and  the  shop  as  factors 
in  the  training  of  future  foremen,  workmen  and 
engineers  has  greatly  decreased  as  a  result  of  the 
changes  just  mentioned.  As  this  function  of  these 
two  important  institutions  atrophies,  the  school  is 
9  129 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

obliged  to  take  upon  itself  new  obligations ;  and  its 
proper  sphere  of  action  enlarges  to  meet  the  new 
situation.  The  technical  school,  the  manual-train- 
ing high  school,  ward-school  manual  training  and 
the  laboratory  have  been  grafted  on  to  our  educa- 
tional system  to  meet  the  demands  for  boys  who 
possess  trained  hands  and  eyes, — boys  who  are  able 
to  plan  and  to  execute, — ^boys  who  are  industrious 
and  not  afraid  of  overalls  and  jumpers, — boys  who 
have  to  a  high  degree  the  power  of  applying 
knowledge  to  industrial  operations.  The  value  of 
a  good  home  in  the  building  of  character  is  not 
minimized  or  called  into  question.  But  the  changed 
environment  in  and  about  the  home,  its  complete 
isolation  from  productive  industry,  cooking  ex- 
cepted, has  caused  it  to  lose  its  leading  position  as 
a  factor  in  industrial  training. 

The  future  of  manufacture  depends  largely  upon 
the  new  human  material  which  is  supplied  to  the 
shop  and  factory.  Brains,  the  ability  to  do,  not 
stores  of  unassimilated  and  unapplicable  knowledge, 
is  the  great  need  and  demand  of  to-day  in  the 
machine  shop  and  the  foundry  as  well  as  in  the 
counting  house  and  the  Congressional  chamber. 
The  school  must  be  looked  to  in  the  future  to  fill 
this  standing  order  for  trained,  resourceful  men. 

Lines  of  demarkation  must  be  carefully  drawn 
between  the  trade,  the  manual-training  and  the 
technical  school.  All  three  are  important;  each  has 
its  legitimate  sphere,  but  their  ends  and  aims  are 
difTerent.  Manual  training  aims  to  give  all  students 
training  of  hand  and  eye.  It  tries  to  give  students 
130 


VALUE    OF    MANUAL    TRAINING 

experience  and  actual  contact  with  materials  and 
processes.  The  trade  school  turns  its  energies 
toward  fitting  the  student  for  some  particular  trade. 
The  manual-training  school,  on  the  other  hand, 
attempts  to  give  a  more  general  training.  The 
latter  does  not  aim  to  train  carpenters,  blacksmiths, 
machinists,  or  mechanical  draftsmen,  but  it  does 
strive  to  give  the  student  a  first-hand  knowledge 
of  industrial  operations  and  processes.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  does  not  aim  to  present  the  scientific 
principles  of  engineering;  this  function  belongs  to 
the  technical  school.  The  call  for  manual  training 
is  a  direct  result  of  the  extensive  modifications  in 
our  industrial  and  social  life;  its  aim  is  primarily 
disciplinary.  Although  manual  training  fits  young 
men  for  certain  classes  of  occupations  rather  than 
for  others,  this  is  an  indirect  and  incidental  result. 
High-school  manual-training  work  is  more  highly 
specialized  than  ward-school  work,  and  is  un- 
doubtedly more  valuable  for  the  future  mechanic 
or  engineer  than  for  the  lawyer  or  the  merchant. 
The  ward-school  manual  work  is,  on  the  other  hand, 
almost,  if  not  quite,  equally  valuable  for  all  students. 
The  trade  school  ought  to  complete  the  school  train- 
ing of  a  skilled  worker  who  has  taken  the  manual- 
training  work  which  should  be  given  by  the  public 
schools.  The  trade  school  is  to  the  skilled  artisan 
what  the  technical  school  is  to  the  engineer;  and 
the  technical  school  is  to  the  manual-training  high 
school  what  the  college  is  to  the  English  or  Latin 
high  school.  The  manual-training  high  school  isj 
131 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

designed  to  furnish  a  preparation  for  the  trade 
school,  the  technical  school  or  for  apprenticeship. 

The  technical  school  provides  preparation  for 
students  who  intend  to  become  professional  mining, 
electrical,  civil,  mechanical,  textile  or  chemical 
engineers.  The  trade  school  has  never  been  a  part 
of  our  public-school  system,  while  the  manual-train- 
ing work  is  now  found  in  the  curriculum  of  all  our 
good  city  schools.  Nearly  all,  if  not  all,  of  our 
State  Universities  have  technical  departments.  Do- 
mestic science  is  properly  a  subdivision  under  the 
general  head  of  manual  training.  This  work  is  to 
the  girls  what  shop  work  and  mechanical  drawing 
are  to  the  boys.  Before  the  sixth  or  seventh  grade 
the  work  is  rarely  differentiated  according  to  sex; 
after  that  period  as  a  rule  it  is.  As  in  the  case  of 
the  work  for  boys,  domestic  science  is  given  pri- 
marily for  its  educational  value;  the  practical  les- 
sons are  subordinate  although  very  important. 

Manual  training  aids  particularly  two  classes  of 
workers  in  the  industrial  field :  first,  the  young  men 
who  are  fitted  for,  and  able  to  take,  advanced  tech- 
nical work;  second,  those  who  must  go  directly 
from  the  grammar  or  high  school  into  the  shop,  or 
in  some  cases  into  the  trade  school. 

The  latter  class  must  not  be  overlooked  or  neg- 
lected as  unimportant.  It  is  unfortunate  that  as 
yet  our  school  curricula  are  drawn  up  primarily  to 
benefit  the  small  percentage  who  go  to  college  or 
technical  school;  secondary  consideration  only  is 
granted  the  larger  number  who  go  directly  into  their 
life  work.  The  future  progress  and  prosperity 
13a 


VALUE    OF    MANUAL    TRAINING 

of  the  country  is  as  dependent  upon  a  trained 
rank  and  file  in  the  shops  as  upon  the  superior 
character  and  training  of  our  superintendents  and 
engineers.  The  value  of  higher  technical  training 
is  dependent  upon  the  efficiency  of  the  preparatory 
work  in  a  twofold  manner.  The  quality  of  the 
work  done  by  a  student  in  the  technical  school  is 
materially  affected  by  the  kind  of  training  which 
he  has  previously  received  in  the  preparatory 
schools;  and  the  best  engineer  needs  competent 
workmen  in  order  to  carry  his  projects  to  a  suc- 
cessful issue.  Our  technical  schools  might  be  the 
best  in  the  world ;  their  graduates  might  be  the  very 
skilful  engineers,  chemists,  superintendents  and 
designers,  and  yet  if  the  workmen  who  are  to  be 
directed  by  these  men  are  inefficient  and  unskilful 
the  results  of  their  combined  efforts  would  not  be 
encouraging.  Our  industrial  system  would  be  top- 
heavy. 

The  boy  who  goes  into  the  shop  in  his  early 
youth  must  be  taught  neatness  and  accuracy;  and 
he  should  understand  the  elementary  principles  of 
wood  and  metal  working,  mechanical  drawing,  alge- 
bra and  geometry,  and  have  a  fair  command  of  the 
English  language.  If  the  boy  can  be  kept  in  school 
until  the  end  of  his  sixteenth  year  this  amount  of 
training  can  be  given  him.  The  last  two  years  of 
this  course,  which  are  the  first  and  second  years 
of  the  average  manual-training  high-school  course, 
are  extremely  important.  The  value  of  this  work 
is  often  underestimated.  Technical  education  was 
introduced  before  manual  training,  and  when  the 
133 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

latter  was  first  recognized  it  found  a  place  only  in 
the  high  school.  Gradually,  grade  by  grade,  it  has 
crept  down  toward  the  kindergarten  until,  in  many 
American  cities,  manual  training  is  found  in  each 
of  the  twelve  grades.  The  universal  introduction 
of  such  work  into  the  public-school  system  should 
be  demanded  by  clear-sighted  employers  and  labor 
leaders ;  but,  in  order  that  the  young  man  may  reap 
the  benefits  the  school  age  must  also  be  raised.  If 
the  employer  and  employee  will  unite  on  this  propo- 
sition, it  will  mean  much  in  the  future.  In  the  long 
run  the  interests  of  both  are  certainly  harmonious 
in  this  instance.  A  well-trained  class  of  workers 
means  the  maintenance  of  industrial  supremacy,  and 
the  greater  likelihood  of  peaceful  relations  between 
employer  and  employee.  Ignorant,  inefficient  and 
"sweated"  laborers  are  a  menace  to  industrial 
growth  and  development. 

The  large  number  of  students,  living  in  all  sec- 
tions of  the  United  States,  who  are  taking  work  in 
the  correspondence  schools,  in  public,  private  or 
Y.  M.  C.  A.  night  schools,  testifies  to  the  great 
demand  for  elementary  technical  education  and 
manual  training.  Many  of  these  persons  left  school 
at  an  early  age  because  they  were  unable  to  receive 
instruction  of  this  character.  School  teachers  are, 
as  a  rule,  very  conservative.  They  are  too  often 
far  removed  from  the  practical  affairs  of  life,  and 
few  of  them  have  received  such  an  education  as 
will  make  them  appreciate  the  need  of  industrial 
and  manual  training.  This  movement  toward 
greater  emphasis  on  mdustrial  education  must  be 
134 


VALUE    OF    MANUAL    TRAINING 

accelerated  by  those  actively  engaged  in  industrial 
pursuits.  The  latter  should  be  keenly  appreciative 
of  the  need  of  well-prepared  timber  for  the  future 
industrial  edifice. 

Turning  our  attention  to  the  other  boy,  the  future 
technical-school  student,  the  question  immediately 
arises :  What  preparation  does  he  require  ?  It  may 
be  safely  assumed,  with  little  fear  of  controversy, 
that  intellectual  training  alone  does  not  properly  fit 
any  boy,  especially  one  who  is  to  be  engaged  in 
engineering  pursuits,  for  the  active  duties  of  life. 
It  is  extremely  desirable,  if  not  absolutely  necessary, 
that  the  youth  who  is  to  be  the  future  engineer, 
superintendent,  foreman  or  manager  should  receive 
a  careful  training  of  hand  and  eye,  and  that  he 
should  be  brought  into  direct  and  personal  contact 
with  materials  and  machinery  before  he  enters  the 
technical  school  at  the  age  of  eighteen  or  nineteen. 
This  experience  can  be  given  him  in  the  public 
schools.  The  preliminary  work  for  the  engineer 
need  not  be  differentiated  from  that  given  the 
skilled  workmen.  Both  classes  should  receive  the 
same  instruction. 

If  this  instruction  were  given  in  all  or  a  majority 
of  city  and  village  schools,  the  manual-training  high 
school  would  relieve  the  technical  school  of  the 
necessity  of  teaching  joinery,  wood  turning,  ele- 
mentary pattern  making,  forging,  elementary  ma- 
chine-shop work,  and  much  of  the  simpler  work  in 
mechanical  drawing.  In  drawing,  for  example,  the 
graduate  of  the  manual-training  high  school  should 
understand  orthographic  and  isometric  projection, 
135 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

perspective,  tracing  and  blue  printing.  He  should 
be  able  to  execute  neat,  accurate  and  well-lettered 
working  drawings  of  existing  machines,  but  he 
should  not  be  expected  to  design  such  machines. 

Manual  and  mental  training  must  ever  proceed 
hand  in  hand ;  the  one  is  not  complete  without  the 
other.  Exactly  as  the  arithmetic,  the  algebra  and 
the  geometry  taught  in  the  high  school  are  prepara- 
tory to  the  work  in  higher  mathematics  of  the  tech- 
nical school,  should  the  shop  work  and  drawing  be 
preparatory  to  laboratory  work  and  machine  design. 
The  present  duplication  of  equipment  and  conse- 
quent waste  of  energy  can  be  avoided.  The  techni- 
cal school  has  its  own  definite  and  urgent  problems 
to  solve ;  it  ought  not  to  be  asked  to  maintain  this 
preparatory  work,  which  should  be  given  to  all 
who  enter  industrial  pursuits,  workmen  as  well  as 
engineers. 

The  American  workman  is  intelligent  and  re- 
sourceful; as  a  consequence  he  is  a  very  efficient 
man.  The  United  States,  thanks  to  its  material 
resources  and  the  sturdy  character  of  its  inhabitants, 
has  forced  itself  into  the  front  rank  of  industrial 
nations.  Shall  it  continue  in  this  desirable  posi- 
tion? It  has  cherished  one  institution  which,  if 
properly  utilized,  will  enable  an  affirmative  answer 
to  be  returned  to  this  question.  This  is  the  Ameri- 
can public-school  system.  By  means  of  its  efforts 
the  present  high  grade  of  intelligence  and  efficiency 
can  be  maintained,  but  its  future  ideal  must  be 
to  find  the  proper  work  for  each  of  its  students. 
The  school  must  say  emphatically  that  a  first-class 
136 


VALUE    OF    MANUAL    TRAINING 

machinist,  a  good  fireman  or  an  excellent  carpenter 
is  to  be  preferred  to  a  second-rate  lawyer,  physician, 
minister  or  teacher.  The  necessity  for  primary, 
grammar  and  secondary  manual  training  is  great. 
The  schools  have  too  long  given  a  major  portion  of 
their  time  and  energy  to  a  training  which  was  par- 
ticularly beneficial  to  the  professional  man.  The 
foundation  of  industrial  education  should  be  laid 
strong  and  well;  good  work  in  ward  and  high 
schools  is  essential  to  future  progress  in  the  arts 
and  sciences. 

A  careful  study  ought  to  be  made  as  to  the  extent 
and  character  of  the  industrial  work  which  might 
profitably  be  introduced  into  the  public-school  sys- 
tem; manual  training,  particularly  in  the  ward 
schools,  is  still  in  an  unsettled  and  experimental 
stage.  The  methods  employed  and  the  extent  and 
character  of  the  work  given  are  by  no  means  uni- 
form. The  employer  and  employee  as  well  as  the 
educator  must  consider  this  question ;  out  of  the 
conflict  of  opinion  good  will  come.  Let  it  ever  be 
remembered  that  competent  men  are  needed  in  all 
grades  of  industrial  work,  and  that  the  public  school 
should  render  valuable  service  in  supplying  this 
demand. 

The  manual-training  work  given  in  our  public 
schools  is  not  opposed  actively  by  labor  unions.  As 
it  is  not  the  purpose  of  manual-training  schools  to 
teach  trades,  students  are  not  graduated  who  are 
likely  to  become  competitors,  in  the  immediate  fu- 
ture, of  the  men  who  are  now  in  the  various  trades. 
The  graduates  of  these  schools  need  several  years 
137 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

of  practical  experience  before  becoming  skilled 
journeymen,  although  the  length  of  the  term  of 
apprenticeship  or  probation  is  usually  shorter  than 
that  required  of  the  non-graduate.  In  the  end,  it 
is  believed,  a  better  and  more  efificient  workman  is 
developed  as  a  result  of  the  manual-training  work. 
Labor  unions  do  rightfully  demand  that  the  re- 
quirements for  entrance  into  a  skilled  trade  shall 
not  be  broken  down  by  the  influx  of  young  men 
solely  trained  in  the  schools.  They  demand  that 
the  standard  of  skill  be  kept  high  in  order  that  the 
standard  wage  received  may  keep  up  the  standard 
of  living.  The  unions  do  strenuously  insist  that 
the  trade  school  shall  not  be  used  to  neutralize  the 
work  of  the  unions.  This  demand  is  as  rational 
and  as  just  as  the  demands  of  lawyers,  physicians, 
clergymen  and  teachers  for  rules  and  regulations 
which  act  as  barriers  against  unrestricted  entrance 
into  those  professions  or  trades.  "When  trade 
schools  limit  themselves  to  improving  the  theo- 
retical, technical  and  practical  knowledge  and  skill 
of  those  who  are  already  entered  upon  a  trade, 
unions  seem  to  approve  and  in  many  cases  to  par- 
ticipate in  conducting  them."  The  continuation 
school  in  Europe  is  in  general  approved  and  given 
moral  support  by  the  trade  unions.  These  schools 
aim  only  to  give  opportunity  for  the  development 
of  those  who  are  actually  at  work  in  their  chosen 
trade.  Organized  labor  does  not  antagonize  scien- 
tific instruction,  manual  training  or  industrial  train- 
ing except  in  those  cases  where  it  is  so  given  as  to 
be  deemed  a  menace  to  the  interests  of  the  wage 
138 


VALUE    OF    MANUAL    TRAINING 

earners.  In  other  words,  they  pursue  the  same 
course  which  any  other  economic  class  would  fol- 
low under  similar  circumstances.  In  recent  years 
many  of  the  most  ardent  advocates  of  industrial 
and  trade  education  have  been  men  bitterly  opposed, 
or  unfriendly,  to  labor  unions.  This  fact  has  natu- 
rally caused  union  men  to  look  with  suspicion  upon 
many  proposed  plans  for  industrial  training.  Any 
attempt  to  use  the  public-school  system  to  "smash" 
labor  organizations  is  a  vicious  perversion  of  its 
true  functions. 


T39 


CHAPTER   VIII 

THE  EDUCATIONAL  AND  INDUSTRIAL  SIGNIFI- 
CANCE OF  THE  ARTS  AND  CRAFTS  MOVEMENT 

The  arts  and  crafts  movement  of  to-day  is  a  part 
of  the  great  democratic  movement  in  education.  It 
proclaims  to  the  world  that  beauty,  skill  and  educa- 
tion are  for  all;  that  the  common  thing  should  be 
made  beautiful,  and  the  beautiful,  universal.  The 
importance  of  the  movement  is,  however,  often 
overestimated.  The  abuse  of  the  machine  and  of 
its  products  by  the  friends  of  the  arts  and  crafts 
movement  is  due  to  an  unwarranted  exaggeration 
of  the  educational  and  social  value  of  hand  labor, 
and  to  the  mental  construction  of  an  ideal  but 
mythical  state  of  society  which,  it  is  asserted, 
existed  prior  to  the  development  of  the  modem 
factory.  In  fact,  the  machine  has  its  sphere,  and 
the  hand  likewise  its  important  industrial  function. 
In  an  era  dominated  by  the  machine,  a  movement 
emphasizing  the  importance  of  hand  work  has  a 
high  industrial  and  educational  value.  If  the  ma- 
chine enables  us  to  produce  the  necessities  of  life 
for  all,  it  is,  nevertheless,  the  skilled  human  hand 
which  must  adorn  and  beautify  these  products. 
The  hand  must  find  its  province  where  the  machine 
cannot  go.  In  its  proper  sphere  the  machine  may 
140 


ARTS    AND    CRAFTS 

make  beautiful  things,  and  may  even  far  excel  the 
hand.  It  is  not  fhe  use  of  the  machine,  but  the 
abuse  of  machine  production,  which  should  be  de- 
precated; without  the  machine  much  of  our  present 
material  comfort  would  be  impossible. 

Art  is  a  form  of  industry,  and  industry  properly 
applied  always  brings  forth  a  work  of  art.  The 
mechanic,  fashioning  the  accurate  and  splendid 
tool,  produces  a  true  work  of  art ;  the  man,  forming 
with  infinite  care  and  patience  the  lenses  of  the 
great  Lick  telescope,  brings  into  being  another  work 
of  art.  The  automatic  screw  machine  and  the 
powerful  steam  engine  are  as  certainly  works  of 
art  as  the  paintings  or  the  sculpture  of  the  great 
masters  of  the  Renaissance.  There  is,  and  can  be, 
no  real  art  considered  entirely  apart  and  distinct 
from  industry  and  the  industrial  life  of  the  people. 
As  Emerson  has  said:  "Beauty  must  come  back  to 
the  useful  arts  and  the  distinction  between  the  fine 
and  the  useful  arts  be  forgotten,"  "To  give  people 
pleasure,"  declares  William  Morris,  "in  the  things 
they  must  perforce  use,  that  is  the  great  office  of 
decoration;  to  give  people  pleasure  in  the  things 
they  must  perforce  make,  that  is  the  other  use  of 
it.'*  Art  is  a  way  of  doing  things  and  resides  in 
the  common  as  well  as  in  the  uncommon,  at  home 
as  well  as  abroad,  in  the  present  as  well  as  in  the 
past.  "The  purpose  of  art,"  writes  J.  Q.  Adams, 
"it  would  seem,  should  be  to  idealize  work." 

The  old  craftsmen  were  artists.  They  wrought 
with  infinite  care  as  much  for  the  satisfaction  of 
doing  good  and  true  work  as  for  the  money  value 
141 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

of  the  product.  The  products  of  the  craftsman's 
skill  were  few,  and  only  the  ruling  classes  were 
privileged  to  possess  them.  The  laboring  masses 
were  busily  engaged  in  obtaining  the  bare  neces- 
sities of  life;  no  thought  of  comfort,  art  or  educa- 
tion entered  into  their  lives.  The  craftsman  did 
unite  art  and  industry;  but  the  modern  conception 
of  democracy  did  not  exist.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  modern  workman  is  only  a  link  in  a  great  in- 
dustrial chain.  He  repeats,  in  a  monotonous  rou- 
tine, certain  simple  movements;  no  realizing  sense 
of  the  true  social  value  or  significance  of  the  work 
which  he  performs  ever  comes  to  him.  Long  hours 
and  routine  work  crush  the  individuality  and  am- 
bition out  of  him. 

The  specialized  worker  necessarily  has  narrow 
views  of  life;  his  ability  to  enjoy  is  limited.  The 
opportunity  and  privileges  of  both  working  and 
leisure  hours  are  only  partially  utilized.  It  has 
been  said  that  for  a  man  of  twenty,  pleasure  is 
business;  of  thirty,  business  is  business;  and  of 
forty,  business  is  pleasure.  It  might  further  be 
maintained  that  there  is  little  pleasure  outside  of 
business  for  the  ordinary  man  of  forty  or  fifty. 
Business,  the  grind  of  daily  life,  has  engrossed  the 
entire  energies  of  the  man.  Enjoyment  in  life 
means  enjoyment  of  leisure  and  of  work.  The  un- 
skilled laborer  enjoys  neither — why?  His  work  is 
monotonous  and  wearing,  the  surroundings  of  home 
and  workshop  are  not  inspiring,  and  he  has  re- 
ceived no  training  which  will  aid  him  in  finding  and 
142 


ARTS    AND    CRAFTS 

utilizing  the  few  opportunities  for  rational  enjoy- 
ment which  come  to  him. 

The  present  arts  and  crafts  movement  is  a  protest 
against  and  a  reaction  from  the  minute  division  of 
labor  now  employed  in  manufacture,  and  the  strip- 
ping of  the  artistic  features  from  industry.  Arti- 
cles are  made  to  sell  more  particularly  than  to  serve 
a  useful  and  important  service.  Profit,  not  service, 
is  now  the  watchword  of  industry.  Art  in  the 
crafts  would  emphasize  service.  The  arts  and 
crafts  movement  aims  to  give  dignity  to  the  worker, 
and  to  teach  that  all  should  be  workers.  The  man 
of  leisure  is  a  drone  and  a  parasite.  The  efficient 
service  of  each  individual  is  needed  by  society. 
Only  when  all  are  workers  and  each  striving  to  do 
his  best  work  does  society  approach  an  ideal  con- 
dition. 

The  arts  and  crafts  movement  needs  educated 
producers  and  consumers.  The  task  is  a  double 
one;  the  workers  must  be  trained  to  produce  good 
work,  and  the  taste  of  all  consumers  must  be  edu- 
cated so  that  they  will  demand  good  articles. 
Shorter  hours  and  the  right  use  of  leisure  will  give 
an  impetus  to  the  demand  for  better  qualities  of 
goods;  and  thus  variety  and  handicraftsmanship 
will  to  some  extent  replace  interchangeability  and 
machine  production.  All  civilized  men  demand  the 
necessities  of  life — food,  clothing  and  shelter — of  a 
character  not  greatly  dissimilar ;  these  common  re- 
quirements lend  themselves  readily  to  machine  pro- 
duction. Industrial  operations  in  which  machinery 
is  the  chief  factor  are  directed  toward  producing 
143 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

the  greatest  possible  quantity  of  a  uniform  quality; 
therefore,  as  far  as  inventive  skill  will  allow,  the 
machine  and  natural  forces,  rather  than  human  skill 
and  energy,  are  employed  in  producing  goods  which 
satisfy  the  common  needs  of  all  men.  The  class 
of  work  in  which  skill  is  the  determining  factor 
aims  to  improve  the  quality  rather  than  to  increase 
the  quantity  produced.  As  the  demand  for  the 
latter  class  of  goods  increases,  the  call  for  skilled 
workers  will  also  increase. 

There  are  indications  of  a  revival  of  those  in- 
dustries involving  more  skilful  hand  work.  More 
interest  is  being  manifested,  throughout  the  coun- 
try, in  art,  architecture  and  the  products  of  the 
various  handicrafts.  The  increased  attention  paid 
to  art  and  drawing  in  our  public  schools  is  another 
indication  of  the  coming  change  in  the  spirit  and 
demands  of  the  American  people.  The  result  of 
such  training  on  the  next  generation  will  be  great, 
and  its  effect  cumulative  on  the  succeeding  one. 
Industries  involving  artistic  ability  and  intricate 
manual  skill  are  incapable  of  minute  division  ol 
labor.  The  gain  resulting  from  the  centralization 
of  industry  and  the  division  of  labor  is  very  small 
in  this  class  of  work.  It  is  well  adapted,  however, 
to  small  factories  and  workshops,  and  forms  an 
appropriate  kind  of  industry  for  small  villages.  If 
there  is  to  be  any  considerable  revival  of  village 
industry,  it  must  come  through  an  increase  in  the 
demand  for  the  products  of  skilled  manual  work. 

The  use  of  steam  and  the  lack  of  adequate  rural 
transportation  facilities  forced  the  abandonment  of 
144 


ARTS    AND    CRAFTS 

village  industry  and  built  up  the  existing  great  in- 
dustrial centers.  In  recent  years  the  increasing  use 
of  electricity  for  the  distribution  and  application  of 
power  is  changing  the  location  and  internal  ar- 
rangement of  our  shops.  This,  together  with  the 
rapid  growth  of  suburban  and  interurban  electric 
lines,  is  placing  the  villages  and  rural  community 
in  a  better  condition  for  industrial  pursuits.  The 
separation  of  agriculture  and  manufacture  will,  as 
a  result,  probably  be  less  in  the  future  than  in  the 
present  or  the  immediate  past. 

Two  great  forces,  in  addition  to  the  work  of  the 
school,  may  be  discerned  to  be  removing  the  ob- 
stacles in  the  path  of  the  arts  and  crafts  movement 
— the  decentralizing  tendency  of  electricity  when 
used  to  transmit  power,  and  the  growth  of  the  labor 
movement  which  demands  shorter  hours  and  better 
shop  conditions.  Just  as  the  manual-training  move- 
ment was  a  result  of  economic  and  industrial 
changes,  so  is  the  call  for  art  in  the  crafts  the  result 
of  such  forces.  As  the  machine  displaces  workers, 
many  are  pushed  higher  up  in  the  industrial  scale. 
Such  a  phenomenon  must  also  be  accompanied  by 
an  increased  demand  for  the  products  of  skilled 
workers.  This  movement  is  not  something  evolved 
out  of  the  minds  of  a  few  thoughtful  devotees  of 
art,  but  is  in  harmony  with  and  dependent  upon  the 
needs  of  industrial  and  educational  life.  It  is  an 
evolutionary  movement. 

The  building  up  of  an  industry  involving  skilled 
hand  work  such  as  the  well-known  Roycroft  Shop 
at  East  Aurora,  New  York,  is  significant.  This 
10  145 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

kind  of  industry  is  appropriate  for  small  villages. 
If  there  is  to  be  any  considerable  revival  of  village 
industry  it  must  come  through  this  class  of  work. 
The  extended  use  of  electrical  distribution  of  power 
will  not  revolutionize  the  forms  of  industry  involv- 
ing the  use  of  much  machinery  and  the  division  of 
labor,  although  it  may  modify  and  improve  the  con- 
ditions, and  be  of  great  benefit  to  the  laborer  and  to 
society.  One  valuable  feature  of  the  revival  of 
interest  in  the  arts  and  crafts  should  be  an  earnest 
endeavor  to  keep  alive  particular  small  industries 
and  to  continue  the  special  skill  of  each  people  who 
migrate  to  this  country.  This,  indeed,  should  be 
one  of  the  peculiar  tasks  which  the  arts  and  crafts 
movement  should  take  upon  itself. 

Numerous  arts  and  crafts  societies  have  recently 
been  formed  in  the  larger  cities  and  in  many  small 
villages  of  the  land.  Many  individuals  may  also  be 
found  who  are  working  in  private  studios  or  work- 
shops. Chicago  was  one  of  the  first  of  American 
cities  to  take  an  active  interest  in  this  movement. 
The  Chicago  Arts  and  Crafts  Society,  probably  the 
pioneer  American  society  of  this  nature,  was  organ- 
ized at  Hull  House  in  1897.  The  Hull  House 
Labor  Museum  was  opened  in  1900.  The  textile 
department  is  the  most  interesting  and  complete 
part  of  this  institution.  It  was  organized  "for  the 
purpose  of  exhibiting  industrial  processes  in  various 
stages  of  their  evolution,  and  thus  offering  a  sort 
of  education  in  industrial  history  in  the  form 
in  which  it  would  be  most  easily  comprehended, 
and  at  the  same  time  emphasizing  the  dignity  and 
146 


ARTS    AND    CRAFTS 

importance  of  labor."^  Hull  House  is  situated  in  a 
portion  of  the  city  inhabited  by  foreigners.  To  the 
labor  museum  the  foreign  women  come  to  carry  on 
their  various  kinds  of  industries, — spinning,  weav- 
ing, dyeing,  hammock  weaving,  basket  making,  etc. 
Syracuse,  New  York,  is  a  well-known  center  of 
this  movement.  The  Craftsman  Workshops  are 
located  in  this  city.  In  these  shops  a  variety  of 
work  is  produced  such  as  furniture,  leather  work, 
needle  work,  metal  work.  These  workshops  are 
operated  under  the  motto :  "We  have  pledged  our- 
selves never  to  produce  anything  that  degrades  a 
man  to  make  or  sell.  We  have  set  before  us  ideals 
of  honesty  of  material,  solidity  of  construction, 
utility,  and  adaptability  to  place,  and  aesthetic 
effect," — an  ideal  worthy  of  John  Ruskin  or  Wil- 
liam Morris. 

In  Boston  an  arts  and  crafts  high  school  has  been 
proposed  as  a  part  of  the  public-school  system. 
During  the  school  year,  1903- 1904,  the  students  of 
the  Toledo  University  School  formed  an  Arts  and 
Crafts  Society.  This  was  continued  the  next  school 
year,  any  person  in  the  city  being  made  eligible  to 
membership.  The  shops  of  the  school  were  thrown 
open  at  certain  periods  of  the  week  to  members  of 
this  society. 

In  certain  districts  of  Kentucky,  Tennessee, 
Georgia  and  North  Carolina,  attempts  have  been 
made  to  revive  the  domestic  industries  of  spinning, 
weaving,  rag-carpet  making,  etc.     A  writer  in  the 

*  "Revival   of   Handicrafts   in   America,"   Bulletin   of    the 
Bureau  of  Labor,  No.  55,  p.  1584. 
147 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

Bulletin  of  the  Bureau  of  Labor  offers  the  follow- 
ing justification  for  this  effort:  "The  revival  of 
domestic  weaving  and  rug-making  is  of  economic 
importance  chiefly  as  a  means  of  providing  employ- 
ment for  persons  living  in  rural  districts  and  hav- 
ing little  else  to  occupy  their  time  and  interest 
during  the  winter  months,  and  also  for  city  men 
and  women  who  are  incapable  of  supporting  them- 
selves at  more  difficult  occupations."  The  School 
of  Education  of  the  University  of  Chicago  has 
utilized  the  study  of  the  textile  handicrafts  in  con- 
nection with  its  elementary  school.  It  emphasizes 
the  value  of  the  simple  handicrafts  in  the  process 
of  educating  the  child.  Weaving  has  also  been  in- 
troduced into  the  schools  of  the  city  of  Minneapolis. 
Very  closely  related  to  the  arts  and  crafts  move- 
ment is  a  movement  for  beautifying  our  towns  and 
cities,  resulting  from  the  associated  activity  of  many 
public-spirited  individuals.  Charles  Mulford  Rob- 
inson, in  his  book  entitled  The  Improvement  of 
Towns  and  Cities,  enumerates  a  long  list  of  civic 
improvement  societies  of  various  sorts,  all  of  which 
have  for  their  object  the  improvement  of  our 
municipal  housekeeping.  These  societies  and  local 
clubs  aim  to  improve  the  character  and  aesthetic 
quality  of  public  property, — property  which  is 
owned  and  enjoyed  collectively.  Some  of  the 
specific  objects  for  which  these  associations  are 
organized  are  the  planting  of  trees  and  shrubs  in 
the  public  streets  and  boulevards,  street  cleaning, 
park  improvement,  the  removal  of  billboards  and 
artistic  planning  and  grouping  of  public  buildings. 
148 


ARTS    AND    CRAFTS 

Every  improvement  in  a  town  or  city  which  tends 
to  enhance  its  beauty  or  to  make  it  more  cheerful 
and  attractive  tends  also  to  better  the  social  and 
educational  conditions  in  that  community.  The 
arts  and  crafts  societies  and  the  various  civic  im- 
provement leagues  are  very  important  subsidiary 
educational  agencies. 


m 


CHAPTER   IX 

ORGANIZED   LABOR  AND   EDUCATIONAL 
PROGRESS 

One  of  the  most  important,  significant  and  char- 
acteristic economic  and  industrial  phenomena  of  re- 
cent times  is  the  development  of  labor  unionism. 
The  rapid  growth  of  labor  organizations  in  numbers 
and  in  influence  during  the  last  two  or  three  dec- 
ades has  given  to  this  movement  a  place  of  great 
importance.  Modern  industrial  and  social  condi- 
tions have  prepared  and  fertilized  the  soil  from 
which  the  present  army  of  organized  workers  has 
sprung.  The  labor  movement  is  part  of  a  great 
social  adjustment  which  is  raising  an  important 
class  in  the  community  up  to  a  higher  economic  and 
social  plane  of  life.  It  is  like  modern  educational 
advance,  distinctly  and  positively  a  democratic 
movement.  Labor's  place  in  history  is  definitely 
marked  by  the  institutions  of  slavery  and  serfdom. 
Only  in  recent  generations,  after  repeated  multipli- 
cations of  the  world's  productive  capabilities,  has 
labor  been  given  a  place  of  theoretical  equality  with 
military  service  and  professional  practice ;  the  labor 
union  aims  to  uphold  the  honor  and  dignity  of 
labor  with  the  hands,  to  give  practical  value  to 
ethical  ideals  as  to  manual  labor.  Precedent  and 
■  ISO 


ORGANIZED    LABOR 

dominant  class  interests  are  strong  forces  acting 
in  direct  and  unceasing  opposition  to  the  aims  and 
ideals  of  the  labor  movement.  Precedent  assigns 
labor  to  a  lower  social  and  political  plane,  while 
progress  with  the  wand  of  industrial  efficiency  ever 
points  upward  and  onward  toward  release  from 
ceaseless  toil  and  social  degradation. 

In  uneducated  primitive  communities  precedent 
becomes  a  fetish,  or  is  crystallized  into  hard  and 
fast  law.  Approximately  as  the  rate  of  national 
progress  or  change  increases  does  the  authority  of 
precedent  decrease  and  its  glamour  fade  away. 
Precedent — the  past — has  its  lessons  for  all  times, 
but  it  ought  not  to  be  applied  unmodified  to  present 
conditions.  Precedent  represents  the  balance  struck 
between  opposing  classes  and  interests  in  times  and 
circumstances  now  forever  behind  us.  Its  unmodified 
application  to  to-day's  problems  is  a  blind  attempt 
to  substitute  a  former  equilibrium  of  social  forces 
for  that  of  to-day.-  Education  should  look  into  the 
past  in  order  to  show,  as  far  as  possible,  the  condi- 
tions formerly  extant.  It  should  point  out  the 
forces  which  make  for  progress,  and  should  assist 
in  assigning  precedent  to  its  rightful  place  in  the 
social  order  of  to-day.  The  present  is  continually, 
unceasingly  passing  into  the  past,  and  the  future  is 
ever  on  the  threshold  of  the  present.  Action  to-day 
is  precedent  to-morrow.  The  dominant  issue  to-day 
is  industrial  freedom  and  equality,  the  striking 
down  of  precedents  which  shackle  the  limbs  of 
the  awakening  labor  movement — the  spirit  of  true 
democracy ;  and  two  great  interwoven  factors 
ISI 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

in  the  struggle  are  universal  education  adapted  to 
the  needs  of  all,  and  the  institution  of  organized 
labor.  The  concept  of  universal  education  as  a 
powerful  economic  and  social  engine  did  not  rise 
to  a  prominent  place  in  the  social  consciousness 
until  organized  labor  became  a  powerful  factor  in 
our  industrial  Hfe.  The  labor  union  has  been  char- 
acterized as  a  great  Americanizing  agent.  Natur- 
ally it  ought  to  be  and  is  an  efficient  aid  and 
complement  to  our  educational  institutions. 

"Trade  unionism  is  the  assertion  of  the  principle 
that  men  have  common  interests,  not  only  in  their 
particular  trades,  but  also  through  every  department 
of  life,  and  that  it  is  their  duty  to  help  each  other  in 
difficulty,  and  to  defend  each  other  when  in  danger, 
in  short,  that  individual  advancement  is  good  when 
it  does  not  hurt  the  general  welfare."^  The  school 
should,  and  actually  does,  emphasize  personal 
efficiency,  usefulness  as  a  producer,  and  economy  in 
consumption.  It  seems  that  the  school  must  neces- 
sarily lay  stress  upon  the  individual's  characteristics. 
The  union,  on  the  other  hand,  stands  for  solidarity, 
for  brotherhood ;  if  not  as  yet  for  all  men,  at  least 
for  a  considerable  portion  of  mankind.  The  union 
emphasizes  mutual  interdependence  and  the  subor- 
dination of  individual  advantage  for  the  good  of 
the  whole.  In  its  ideal  form  it  stands  for  the  bet- 
terment of  society  and  for  the  growth  of  altruism. 
The  ethics  of  organized  labor  and  the  ethics  of  cut- 
throat competition  are  radically  different.  The 
labor  union  did  not  become  a  great  power  until 

*  Dyer,  Evolution  of  Industry,  p.  99. 
152 


ORGANIZED    LABOR 

competition  reached  an  advanced  stage  in  its  de- 
velopment, until  combination  in  many  fields  began 
to  replace  competition  and  the  alternatives  offered 
the  laborer  were  few,  until  the  latter  came  face  to 
face  with  the  difficulties  in  obtaining  a  job  which 
are  at  present  so  familiar.  Economic  interest  makes 
for  combination  and  integration.  This  phenomenon 
is  also  visible  in  the  world  of  capital,  but  the  latter 
is  impersonal ;  many  units  can  be  held  by  one  man 
as  well  as  by  more  than  one.  Labor,  on  the  other 
hand,  is  personal,  and  the  unit  is  the  labor  power  of 
an  individual.  Each  man  is  the  seller  of  his  own 
individual  labor  power.  One  man  cannot  take  unto 
himself  the  labor  strength  of  many  individuals. 
Notwithstanding  this  vital  difference,  units  of  labor 
are  forced  into  a  compact  union  just  as  many  units 
of  capital  gravitate  into  one  company  or  combina- 
tion of  companies.  The  union  man  is  in  some  re- 
spects like  a  share  in  a  corporation ;  injure  one  man 
or  injure  one  share  and  you  injure  the  whole. 
Competition  leads,  in  many  cases  at  least,  to  com- 
bination, and  combination  brings  forth  a  new 
ethic,  a  new  and  high  code  of  morality  in  regard  to 
those  within  the  combination,  and  perhaps  finally  in 
the  dim  and  shadowy  future,  let  us  hope,  in  regard 
to  all  mankind. 

The  great  growth  in  numbers  and  considerable 
increase  in  strength  which  has  come  to  the  labor 
union  movement  in  recent  years  is  due  in  a  large 
measure  to  an  increase  in  class  consciousness.  An 
important  class-conscious  wage-earning  class  was 
not  possible  at  a  period  when  nearly  every  worker 
153 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

expected  to  pass  sooner  or  later  from  the  position 
of  employee  to  that  of  employer.  In  the  America 
of  many  small  competing  industries  and  of  free  land 
a  class-conscious  body  of  wage-earners  was  prac- 
tically, but  not  entirely,  non-existent.  Trade 
unionism  and  class  consciousness  could  not  attain 
a  strong  foothold  until  the  frontier  disappeared, 
and  until  centralization  and  the  systematic  exploita- 
tion of  natural  resources  and  of  special  privileges 
were  the  rule.  But  to-day,  with  no  frontier,  with 
centralized  industries,  with  a  large  decrease  of  em- 
ployers and  managers  relative  to  the  number  of 
employees,  with  the  growth  of  social  rigidity,  the 
aspect  is  totally  changed.  Trade  unionism,  social- 
ism, exploitation,  class  conflict,  now  become  familiar 
terms. 

Federation  and  cooperation  for  mutual  benefit 
only  become  possible  when  the  workers  have  time 
and  opportunity  to  receive  and  assimilate  the  bene- 
fits of  culture  and  education.  National  and  interna- 
tional unions  signify  a  higher  grade  of  intelligence, 
and  a  more  socialized  view  of  life,  than  the  older 
forms  of  organizations  with  their  individualism 
and  lack  of  mutual  cooperation  and  aid.  His- 
tory teaches  that  nations  wax  strong  and  power- 
ful only  when  they  band  together  in  compact, 
cooperating  states.  Isolated  and  mutually  distrust- 
ful tribes,  lacking  strength  and  coherence,  are 
pushed  to  the  wall  by  the  strong  arm  of  the  organ- 
ized tribe  or  nation.  Primitive  tribes  frittered  away 
their  strength  fighting  each  other  until  a  stronger, 
because  more  closely  united,  people  came  and 
154 


ORGANIZED    LABOR 

dispossessed  them  of  their  homes  and  heritage,  and 
transformed  them  into  a  subject  class  or  caste. 
Similar  conditions  obtain  in  regard  to  the  laboring 
class.  Individual  bargaining  against  organized 
corporate  capital  is  hopeless;  the  individual  is 
sweated  exactly  as  the  conquered  tribe  was  ex- 
ploited. Only  as  the  workers  gradually  emerge 
from  their  lowly  estate,  only  as  machinery  makes 
possible  a  shorter  working  day  and  universal  edu- 
cation, does  the  opportunity  of  cooperating  together 
or  of  organizing  into  large  units  become  a  reality. 
When  this  view  of  cooperation,  or  of  class 
solidarity,  is  accepted  by  a  large  mass  of  individuals, 
a  still  broader  and  more  Utopian  conception  comes 
in  sight,  that  of  universal  cooperation — a  union  of 
employers,  employees  and  consumers.  The  idea 
emerges  from  the  chaos  of  the  past  that  the  indus- 
trial world,  rationally  considered,  is  a  great  co- 
operative establishment  for  the  material  and  social 
good  of  all, — not  of  one  sect,  class,  race,  but  of  all 
sects,  classes  and  races.  This  idea  inevitably  leads 
to  the  dawning  recognition  of  the  fact  that  the 
division  of  mankind  into  superimposed  and  distinct 
layers  called  castes,  or  classes,  is  due  to  artificial, 
legal,  political,  religious  or  economic  conventions. 
Each  individual,  as  was  previously  pointed  out,  is 
in  reality  best  adapted  to  a  particular  vocation ;  it 
becomes,  according  to  this  concept  of  society,  the 
duty  of  our  schools  and  other  educational  institu- 
tions to  assist  each  individual  member  of  society 
to  find  his  proper  vocation.  The  welfare  of  soci- 
ety and  of  humanity  is  best  advanced  when  all 
155 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

individuals  and  all  nations  are  playing  their  appro- 
priate parts  without  social  or  industrial  friction. 
Such  a  condition  is  merely  a  shadow-like  ideal 
toward  which  humanity  is  slowly  and  falteringly 
groping  its  way.  The  labor  unions  seem  to  have 
grasped  this  ideal  more  firmly  than  has  any  other 
organization,  with  the  possible  exception  of  the 
church,  but  they  necessarily  fall  far  below  the  mark 
in  actual  practice.  If  labor  unions  are  exclusive,  if 
they  aim  at  benefiting  the  few  at  the  expense  of  the 
many,  is  it  entirely  unexpected?  Mistakes  certainly 
will  be  made;  men  with  better  opportunities  and 
training  are  guilty  of  aggression  and  of  class 
prejudices  and  hatreds.  The  mental  horizon  of  the 
wage-earner  is,  as  yet,  perforce  limited.  The  coun- 
terpart of  the  "arrogance"  of  wealth  is  too  often 
found  in  the  intolerance  and  slight  consideration 
shown  by  organized  workers  toward  their  weaker, 
unorganized  and  often  misguided  brothers.  How- 
ever, the  brutality  of  a  labor  monopoly  is  certainly 
no  worse  than  that  of  a  capitalistic  monopoly, 
although  it  manifests  itself  in  a  somewhat  different 
and  less  subtile  form. 

There  is  no  gainsaying  the  fact  that  the  labor 
unions  and  farmers'  organizations  have  always 
stood  for  high  ideals  and  broad  conceptions  of 
humanity.  As  early  as  1829  a  labor  paper.  The 
Working  Man's  Advocate,  demanded  among  other 
things  no  imprisonment  for  debt,  a  general  bank- 
ruptcy law,  no  monopolies,  the  freedom  of  public 
lands,  a  mechanics'  lien  law,  equal  rights  for  women, 
156 


ORGANIZED    LABOR 

no  chattel  or  wage  slavery.^  These  demands  were 
called  "shocking"  by  clergymen  and  property  own- 
ers of  that  time.  A  motto  of  the  Knights  of  Labor 
reads:  "An  injury  to  one  is  an  injury  to  all";  and 
the  Boot  and  Shoe  Worker's  Union  declared,  "Each 
for  all  and  all  for  each."  In  1832  the  New  Eng- 
land Association  of  Farmers,  Mechanics,  and  other 
Workingmen  wished  to  remedy  the  following  evil: 
"An  illiberal  opinion  of  the  worth  and  rights  of  the 
laboring  classes ;  an  unjust  estimate  of  their  moral, 
intellectual,  and  physical  powers ;  an  unwise  mis- 
apprehension of  the  effect  which  would  result  from 
the  cultivation  of  their  minds  and  the  improvement 
of  their  conditions."^  The  editor  of  the  Inde- 
pendent, commenting  on  an  article  entitled,  "New 
York  Subways,"  says:  "Mr.  Warner  establishes 
his  assertion  that  the  element  in  the  community 
which  from  first  to  last  has  clearly  seen  the  true 
public  interest,  has  formulated  it  in  unequivocal 
language  and  has  battled  for  it  in  the  forum  of  pub- 
lic opinion  and  in  the  legislature,  has  been  the 
despised  and  maligned  labor  unions."^  For  cen- 
turies the  progress  of  the  world  has  been  steadily 
toward  the  betterment  of  the  position  of  the  labor- 
ing classes.  As  long  as  this  movement  continues 
the  demands  which  workingmen  make  at  any  par- 
ticular time  and  which  are  then  bitterly  opposed 
will  a  few  years  later  be  generally  accepted  as  just 
and  proper  by  all  classes  in  the  community.     As 

*  See  article  by  the  author,  "The  Workingmen's  Party  of 
New  York  City,"  Political  Science  Quarterly,  September,  1907. 
'Quoted  by  Ely,  Labor  Movement  in  America,  p.  51. 
'Independent,  March  9,  1905,  p.  561. 
157 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

long  as  the  uplift  of  this  class  continues,  much  of 
their  program  at  any  given  time  will  represent  the 
true  trend  of  progress.  The  professional,  agri- 
cultural and  commercial  classes  act  as  a  balance 
wheel  and  serve  to  check  excessive  or  ill-timed 
demands  of  the  working  people.  True  progress  is 
always  a  compromise, — a  resultant  of  many  divergent 
forces.  Friends  of  labor  unions  often  point  with 
pardonable  pride  to  the  many  now  well-established 
laws  and  institutions  which  were  originally  sup- 
ported chiefly  by  workingmen;  but  if  we  premise 
that  progress  is  toward  betterment  of  the  workers' 
position,  this  result  might  be  anticipated  a  priori. 

One  of  the  most  commendable  and  important 
demands  of  labor  organizations,  viewed  from  the 
standpoint  of  social  welfare,  is  that  for  legislation 
restricting  the  employment  of  children  and  fixing 
the  maximum  number  of  hours  per  day  which  may 
be  required  of  women  and  children.  Workingmen 
and  students  of  social  and  industrial  questions  have 
for  many  years  keenly  appreciated  the  evils  and 
dangers  which  inevitably  result  from  the  employ- 
ment of  immature  children  in  factories  and  mines. 
If  progress  is  to  continue,  each  generation  must 
bring  into  existence  a  new  set  of  workers  whose 
vigor,  education  and  ability  is  not  less  than  that 
of  itself;  this  is  nothing  less  than  a  fundamental 
social  axiom.  Every  child  is  entitled  to  childhood. 
In  the  modern  civilized  world  it  is  not  necessary 
to  force  him  to  be  a  breadwinner  at  a  time  when 
medical  science,  psychology  and  pedagogy  tell  us 
he  ought  to  be  playing  in  the  open  air  and  bathing 
158 


ORGANIZED    LABOR 

in  the  sunlight,  or  to  be  receiving  in  the  school  some 
of  the  accumulated  experience  of  preceding  genera- 
tions. All  other  aims  and  aspirations  of  the  union 
are  dependent  upon  keeping  children  from  the 
numbing  and  deadening  effects  of  overwork,  and 
giving  them  reasonable  opportunity  for  play  and 
education.  The  breaker  boy  and  the  child  in  the 
cotton  mill  cannot  be  properly  prepared  for  the 
duties  and  obligations  which  may  devolve  upon 
them  when  they  have  grown  to  manhood  or 
womanhood. 

Better  educational  facilities,  shorter  hours,  oppor- 
tunities for  better  use  of  leisure  time,  depend  upon 
the  organization  of  a  strong  band  of  men  and 
women  of  all  working  classes,  skilled  and  unskilled 
mdustrial  workers,  farmers,  clerks,  teachers,  writers 
and  others,  extending  into  every  state,  city,  and 
hamlet  of  the  United  States.  Not  less,  but  more, 
organization  is  needed.  Organization,  education 
and  the  ballot-box  are  the  three  fundamental  fea- 
tures upon  which  progress  and  justice  in  a  modern 
democracy  must  ultimately  rest.  Specific  projects 
for  social,  economic  or  industrial  betterment  receive 
their  strength  and  potency  from  these  three  funda* 
mental  institutions.  The  child-labor  laws  of  the 
northern  states  are  enabling  the  southern  states 
to  build  up  parasitic  industries  resting  upon  the 
insecure  foundation  of  child  labor,  child  enfeeble- 
ment  and  ignorance.  Until  organized  labor  can 
extend  its  strong  arm  over  the  children  of  these 
states,  and  make  its  protest  felt  in  the  state  legis- 
latures, the  outlook  is  discouraging.  As  has  often 
159 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

been  pointed  out,  industrial  legislation  is  extremely 
difficult  to  obtain  in  America  because  of  the  number 
of  states  which  must  legislate  upon  these  subjects, 
and  because  it  is  frequently  of  temporary  advantage 
to  the  manufacturers  and  merchants  of  a  state  if 
labor  legislation  is  "killed,"  or  not  rigidly  enforced. 
This  is  a  new  phase  of  the  old  problem  of  the 
"twentieth  man." 

Much  of  the  opposition  to  child-labor  laws,  fac- 
tory legislation,  eight-hour  laws,  etc.,  is  based,  in 
most  cases  at  least,  not  upon  the  general  welfare  of 
society — including  all  classes — but  upon  certain 
narrow  private  or  class  interests.  The  demands  of 
labor  are  also  undoubtedly  especially  favorable  to 
certain  classes  in  the  community ;  but  if  these 
demands  make  for  the  welfare,  betterment  and 
prosperity  of  the  great  mass  of  society,  they  are 
worthy  of  attainment.  If  the  so-called  "monied 
interests"  are  attempting  to  prevent  or  emasculate 
child-labor  legislation,  tenement-house  reform,  pro- 
vision for  better  schools,  the  initiative  and  refer- 
endum, eight-hour  day  legislation,  municipal 
ownership  of  public  utilities,  railroad-rate  regula- 
tion, and  other  legislation  which  tends  to  reduce 
the  surplus  or  "forced"  gains  now  undoubtedly 
accumulating  in  the  hands  of  a  favored  few ;  if,  as 
Professor  Giddings  believes,  we  are  witnessing  the 
decay  of  "republican  institutions,"  then  the  hope  of 
the  future  depends  upon  the  education  and  organi- 
zation of  the  working  people,  and  new  blood  and 
new  ideals  are  needed  at  the  helm.  The  socialists 
and  many  others  believe  that  the  "trading  class," 
i6o 


ORGANIZED    LABOR 

as  Mr.  Ghent  calls  it,  has  failed  in  its  control  of  the 
nation,  and  that  it  must  suffer  others  to  take  up  its 
task. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  understand  the  cause,  or  to 
trace  out  the  source  of  the  bitterness  of  the  struggle 
which  accompanies  the  gradual  uplift  of  the  lower 
classes.  "It  is  difficult  for  people  to  whom  life  is 
easy  to  appreciate  the  conditions  under  which  others 
are  compelled  to  struggle.  This  is  the  curse  of 
success.  Class  judgments  are  always  wrong,  for 
each  class  appreciates  its  own  positive  excellences 
and  the  limitations  of  others.  The  reason  for  this 
is  that  one  is  known  from  within,  the  other  from 
without."^  Great  differences  in  social  standing, 
occupation  or  experience  necessarily  produce  lack 
of  sympathy  and  absence  of  mutual  understanding. 
It  has  been  said  that  the  vexed  problems  of  labor 
versus  capital  would  be  solved,  easily  and  quickly, 
if  the  capitalist  were  obliged  to  work  side  by  side 
and  live  among  his  employees.  But  humanity  is 
struggling  laboriously  upwards  toward  the  light. 
Over  twenty  years  ago  Professor  Ely  wrote:  "The 
word  humanity  means  more  to-day  than  at  any  past 
period  in  the  history  of  the  race.  The  extension 
of  practical  ethics  has  been  accompanied  by  an 
intensive  growth.  The  stream  has  deepened.  Yet 
the  ethical  ideas  of  most  people  move  chiefly  along 
horizontal  lines,  and  do  not  extend  up  or  down  to 
those  above  or  below  them  in  rank  or  position. 
Social  lines  are  considered  ethical  lines."^    As  labor 

*  Griggs,  The  New  Humanism,  p.  194. 
'  Ely,  Labor  Movement  in  America,  p.  313, 
11  l6l 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

organizations  become  more  and  more  inclusive 
these  lines  are  pushed  farther  and  farther  apart. 
The  skilled  and  the  unskilled  are  joining  hands, 
and  teachers,  public  employees  and  other  profes- 
sional and  semi-professional  workers  are  being 
gradually  drawn  into  the  union  fold.  More  and 
more  inclusive  organization  tends  finally  to  trans- 
form class  antagonism  into  race  solidarity. 

The  labor  union  was  originally  a  mere  fighting 
organization.  It  was  obliged  to  struggle  for  a  right 
to  exist  as  an  organization.  Its  early  endeavors 
were  chiefly  negative,  but  in  recent  years  a  positive 
program  is  being  prepared.  Many  labor  unions  in 
this  country  are  emerging  from  the  fighting, 
destructive  stage  into  an  era  of  constructive  work. 
To-day,  with  a  large  and  rapidly  increasing  mem- 
bership, the  strength  of  organized  labor  is  sufficient 
to  make  it  the  most  potent  factor  in  the  movement 
for  the  betterment  of  the  masses.  The  possible 
social  and  industrial  value  of  our  public-school  sys- 
tem is  beginning  to  be  recognized  by  labor  unions 
and  farmers'  organizations  as  never  before.  The 
free  public  school  appears  when  and  where  suffrage 
is  practically  universal,  when  and  where  the  work- 
ingman  has  political  power.^  Free  public  education 
for  all  children  is,  however,  of  little  value  to  the 
mass  of  the  people  unless  child  labor  is  suppressed, 
unless  reasonable  factory  legislation  is  secured,  and 
unless   a    short   working   day   is   obtained   for   all 

*  Educational    Advance    and    Industrial    Progress    in    the 
United    States,    1820-1850,    by    the    author,    published    as    a 
Bolletin  of  the  yniversity  of  Wisconsin,  April,  1908. 
16? 


ORGANIZED    LABOR 

workers.  After  the  public  school  became  an  estab- 
lished institution  the  next  step  was  to  obtain  legis- 
lation which  would  enable  all  to  receive  some  of  the 
benefits.  The  unions  of  the  decades  immediately 
following  the  close  of  the  Civil  War  actively  urged 
laws  providing  for  an  eight-hour  day,  the  abolition 
of  child  labor  and  compulsory  education. 

The  National  Labor  Union,  organized  in  1866, 
stated  "that  the  first  and  grand  desideratum  of  the 
hour,  ...  is  the  enactment  of  a  law  whereby  eight 
hours  shall  constitute  a  day's  work  in  every  State 
of  the  American  Union."  This  union  recommended 
among  other  things  the  establishment  of  working- 
men's  lyceums  and  reading  rooms,  and  the  estab- 
lishment of  newspapers  devoted  to  the  interests  of 
the  industrial  masses.  The  preamble  of  the  con- 
stitution of  the  Knights  of  Labor  asked  for  "the 
prohibition  by  law  of  the  employment  of  children 
under  fifteen  yenrs  of  age,  the  compulsory  attend- 
ance at  ::chool  ic:  c:  least  ten  months  in  the  year 
of  all  children  between  the  ages  of  seven  and  fifteen 
years,  and  the  furnishing  at  the  expense  of  the 
State  of  free  text-books."  The  original  platform 
of  the  American  Federation  of  Labor,  adopted  in 
1881,  contained  clauses  demanding  compulsory  edu- 
cation, prohibition  of  employment  of  children  under 
fourteen  years  of  age,  and  the  enforcement  of  the 
United  States  eight-hour  law. 

Some  of  the  more  recent  union  utterances  indi- 
cate a  tendency  to  make  more  specific  demands 
for  education.  The  Massachusetts  State  Branch  of 
the  American  Federation  of  Labor,  1902,  asked  for 
163 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

shorter  hours,  "not  only  because  by  so  doing  you 
create  work  for  more,  but  it  also  furnishes  the 
opportunity  for  improved  education,  and  with  it 
improved  conditions  of  labor."  The  preamble  of 
the  constitution  of  the  American  Labor  Union, 
adopted  in  1898,  demanded  "the  education  of  all 
children  up  to  the  age  of  eighteen  years,  and  state 
and  municipal  aid  for  books,  clothing,  and  food." 
The  Amalgamated  Association  of  Street  and  Elec- 
tric Railroad  Employees  of  America  wish  "to  estab- 
lish schools  of  instruction  and  examination  for 
imparting  a  practical  knowledge  of  modern  and 
improved  methods  and  systems  of  transportation 
and  trade  matters  generally."  The  International 
Union  of  Steam  Engineers  conducts  a  regular 
course  of  lectures  in  the  winter  in  order  "to  educate 
our  men  in  all  the  latest  electrical  and  mechanical 
devices."  The  organized  laundry  workers  of  the 
city  of  Chicago  arranged  a  course  of  lectures  for 
the  winter  of  1904-1905.  Many  of  these  lectures 
were  given  in  the  public-school  buildings. 

The  labor  unions  believe  in  a  "practical  educa- 
tion." Perhaps  the  following  extract  from  the 
writings  of  a  partizan  of  organized  labor  furnishes 
a  good  illustration  of  its  position.  "Labor  organ- 
izers were  among  the  first  to  advocate  the  kinder- 
garten and  the  school  of  technology,  long  before 
both  became  the  popular  institutions  which  they  are 
to-day.  Unions  have  not  up  to  the  present  time 
[1901]  favored  'manual'  training  schools  or  'trade' 
schoob,  because  there  has  been  good  reason  to 
believe  that  the$e  schools  would  not  be  managed 
164 


ORGANIZED    LABOR 

by  efficient  teachers  or  be  of  any  practical  value  to 
the  industrial  world.  Workingmen  have  always 
championed  the  practical,  as  against  the  academic, 
in  matters  of  education ;  and  thus,  because  they  have 
opposed  the  projects  of  theorists,  have  sometimes 
been  unjustly  abused  as  obstructionists,"^  Trade 
schools  have  been  especially  feared  because  of  the 
possibility  of  utilizing  their  graduates  to  break 
down  apprenticeship  rules,  and  to  disrupt  union 
organization.  It  seems  reasonable,  however,  to 
assert  that  in  recent  years  the  direct  and  immediate 
initiative  for  specific  betterment  in  education  comes 
first  from  educators  and  students  of  social  and  in- 
dustrial questions;  but  the  force  which  makes  their 
demands  effective,  which  causes  them  to  be  intro- 
duced on  a  large  scale,  is  the  influence  of  the  leaders 
of  that  class  which  will  be  most  directly  and  vitally 
affected  by  the  particular  educational  advance.^ 
And  at  the  bottom,  concealed  from  the  casual 
observer,  is  the  prime  moving  force — economic  and 
social  conditions.  The  strength  of  the  labor  move- 
ment is  now  needed  to  actively  work  for,  and  thus 
to  accelerate,  the  improvement  of  the  school  system 
as  it  now  exists  in  the  United  States,  and  to  aid  in 
making  that  system  a  more  potent  factor  in  the 
betterment  of  the  masses. 

*  Casson,  Organised  Self-JJelp,  p.  202. 

*  See  "Humanitarianism,  Past  and  Present,"  by  the  author. 
International  Journal  of  Ethics,  October,   1906. 


l6s 


L.  t  O  F?  A  R  V 

SfAI£  MUH.V.AL  SCHOiL 

MANUAL  Af<r^  f>"'J  HOME  tCONOHJCS 

SANTA  BARBAKA,  CALIFORNIA 


%\'i^ 


PART  II 

ACTUAL  OR  PROPOSED 

ADDITIONS  TO  THE 
EDUCATIONAL  SYSTEM 


I  ^^ 


CHAPTER   X 
INDUSTRIAL   AND   TRADE   EDUCATION 

The  Kindergarten  Movement 
The  kindergarten  movement  is  particularly  im- 
portant because  it  was  really  the  opening  wedge 
of  the  great  movement  which  is  now  lifting  our 
educational  system  to  a  higher  and  broader  plane 
of  usefulness, — usefulness  for  all  classes  and  ages 
of  students.  At  about  the  same  time  that  the 
kindergarten  was  winning  a  place  in  our  edu- 
cational system,  drawing  began  to  obtain  a  foot- 
hold in  the  schools.  The  idea  that  the  schools 
could  and  should  develop  the  ability  to  use  hand 
and  eye  now  gradually  began  to  impress  itself 
upon  the  minds  of  many  of  our  more  progressive 
educators.  The  kindergarten  and  drawing  are  the 
forerunners  of  the  manual-training  movement  of 
the  decade  1880- 1890.  The  former  were  the  first 
definite  indications  of  the  growth  of  a  belief  that 
the  school  owed  the  child  any  other  duty  than  that 
of  mere  intellectual  training  and  memory  drill. 
The  kindergarten  was  the  first  step  toward  the  con- 
ception that  the  school  must,  under  modern  condi- 
tions, absorb  certain  functions  formerly  performed 
by  the  home,  that  education  ought  to  become  a 
powerful  factor  in  molding  the  social  and  industrial 
169 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

progress  and  life  of  a  people,  and  that  play  was  a 
necessary  and  vital  factor  in  the  education  of  each 
and  every  child.  These  conceptions  were  at  that 
time  radical  in  their  nature. 

The  father  of  the  kindergarten  movement,  Fried- 
rich  Froebel,  established  the  first  kindergarten  in 
Germany  in  1840.  About  thirty  years  later  the 
first  kindergarten  in  the  United  States  was  opened 
in  Boston.  According  to  Miss  Susan  E.  Blow,  one 
of  the  pioneers  of  the  kindergarten  movement,  "The 
history  of  the  kindergarten  in  America  is  the  record 
of  four  sharply  defined  movements:  the  pioneer 
movement,  whose  point  of  departure  was  the  city 
of  Boston;  the  philanthropic  movement,  whose  ini- 
tial effort  was  made  in  the  village  of  Florence, 
Massachusetts,  and  whose  greatest  triumphs  have 
been  achieved  in  San  Francisco ;  the  national  move- 
ment, which  emanated  from  St.  Louis ;  and  the  great 
maternal  movement,  which,  radiating  from  Chicago, 
is  now  spreading  through  the  United  States."  The 
kindergarten  movement  owes  its  visible  inception 
to  the  initiative  and  efforts  of  private  individuals. 
This  will  also  be  found  true  of  the  manual-training 
movement,  the  playground  movement,  the  vacation 
school,  the  trade  school,  the  correspondence  school 
and  other  educational  innovations.  Private  indi- 
viduals must  first  demonstrate  the  worth  of  the  new 
educational  principle,  and  later  the  classes  in  the 
community  most  interested  in  the  particular  move- 
ment force  the  public  authorities  to  add  this  to  the 
work  of  the  school. 

170 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

Manual  Training 
The  well-known  educational  reformer,  Pestalozzi, 
may  be  called  the  founder  of  industrial  train- 
ing. His  famous  school  at  Neuhof  was  an  indus- 
trial school  for  poor  children.  Here  he  substituted 
the  study  of  things  for  that  of  their  symbols. 
To  Finland  belongs  the  honor  of  first  recog- 
nizing the  pedagogical  value  of  manual  train- 
ing. It  was  introduced  into  that  country  by 
Cygnaeus,  and  in  1866  was  made  obligatory  in 
all  primary  and  normal  schools.  At  the  Phila- 
delphia Exposition  in  1876  the  Russian  industrial 
exhibit  accelerated  the  agitation  in  this  country 
which  resulted  during  the  following  decade  in  the 
rapid  introduction  of  manual  training  into  our  city 
schools.  The  pioneer  manual-training  school  was 
opened  in  St.  Louis  in  September,  1880.  The  first 
manual-training  work  in  Boston  was  given  three 
years  later ;  in  1885  the  first  classes  in  cooking  were 
opened  in  that  city.  The  Boston  Mechanics'  Arts 
High  School  was  not  opened  until  1891.  Chicago 
Manual  Training  School  opened  in  1884;  the  Scott 
Manual  Training  School  of  Toledo  began  its  work 
in  that  year.  Baltimore  also  made  a  beginning  in 
1884.  In  1885  Philadelphia  started  its  first  manual- 
training  school.  In  1890  thirty-seven  cities  of 
8,ocK)  or  more  inhabitants  gave  instruction  in 
manual  training;  in  1894,  ninety-five;  in  1896,  one 
hundred  and  twenty-one;  in  1898,  one  hundred  and 
forty-six;  in  1900,  one  hundred  and  sixty-nine;  in 
1902,  two  hundred  and  seventy. 
171 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

Manual  training  in  the  United  States  was  first 
developed  in  the  high  school,  and  has  been  grad- 
ually working  down  through  the  grades  toward  the 
kindergarten.  In  many  cities  it  has  at  last  joined 
hands  with  the  latter,  and  a  continuous  system  of 
manual  training  extends  from  the  kindergarten  to 
the  end  of  the  high  school.  Manual  training  in  the 
grades  below  the  high  school  is  more  important  and 
desirable  than  high-school  manual-training  work, 
for  two  reasons :  it  reaches  a  much  larger  number 
of  pupils,  and  at  a  time  when  training  of  hand  and 
eye  should  properly  begin.  Too  little  time  is  how- 
ever ordinarily  allowed  for  this  work  in  the  grades. 
Two  or  three  hours  per  week  are  an  insufficient 
amount  of  time.  More  stress  should  be  laid  upon 
this  important  part  of  elementary-school  work. 
Laboratory  and  shop  methods  rather  than  library 
methods  ought  to  predominate  in  our  elementary 
schools.  The  young  particularly  need  to  find  oppor- 
tunity for  expression.  Impressions  given  an  ele- 
mentary-school boy  or  girl  by  text-books  or  through 
talks  by  teachers  are  of  greatly  reduced  value 
unless  supplemented  by  opportunity  for  expression. 
Accuracy  and  regularity  are  lessons  which  well- 
chosen  manual  training  teaches.  Culture,  good 
habits,  accurate  and  sound  judgment,  and  ability 
to  do  are  not  imposed  solely  from  without,  but  are 
a  development  of  what  is  within  the  child.  Sta- 
tistics issued  by  the  Bureau  of  Education  show 
conclusively  the  great  need  of  expansion  of  the  ele- 
mentary-school manual  training.  While  high-school 
manual-training  work  may  not  be  desirable  or 
172 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

equally  valuable  for  all  students,  and  perhaps  ought 
not  to  be  required  of  all,  provided  elementary-school 
manual  training  is  required  of  all  students,  psy- 
chological and  physiological  considerations  indicate 
that  this  work  should  be  given  to  every  child  in  the 
elementary  schools. 

The  general  purposes  of  a  course  in  primary- 
school  manual  training,  viewed  from  the  peda- 
gogical standpoint,  have  befen  well  stated  as  follows : 
"(i)  Storing  the  mind  with  true  conceptions  of 
forms  and  colors  and  developing  the  ability  to 
acquire  new  concepts;  (2)  developing  the  ability* to 
select  from  masses  of  materials  that  which  is  appro- 
priate for  specified  or  desired  purposes;  (3)  direct- 
ing the  attention  to  the  essential  elements  of  the 
beautiful  in  nature  and  in  art,  neglecting  in  such 
attention  the  accidental,  thus  developing  the  begin- 
ning of  an  artistic  standard;  (4)  training  the  hand 
to  use,  shape  and  arrange  material  with  neatness, 
accuracy  and  taste,  that  the  learner  may  express 
artistically,  i.e.  with  truth  and  beauty;  (5)  teach- 
ing the  use  of  tools  adapted  to  the  age  and  strength 
of  the  child  and  to  the  character  of  materials 
employed."  The  instruction  in  drawing,  although 
usually  differentiated  from  that  of  manual  training, 
is  essentially  a  part  of  that  work.  Drawing  should 
naturally  proceed  from  the  full  arm  and  body  move- 
ments of  the  lower  grades  to  the  more  accurate  and 
more  ranfined  movements  of  the  seventh  and  eighth 
grades.  The  mistake  of  requiring  small  and  accu- 
rate drawing  from  the  children  in  the  lower  grades 
should  be  avoided.  The  avisability  of  teaching 
173 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

writing  to  children  under  ten  years  of  age  has  been 
seriously  questioned  on  the  ground  that  children 
under  that  age  ought  not  to  be  confined  to  such 
delicate  and  accurate  movements  as  are  required 
in  writing. 

Domestic  Science  or  Household  Economics 

Domestic  science  in  the  public  schools  is  a  special- 
ized form  of  manual  training.  Separate  instruction 
for  the  girls  usually  begins  with  the  seventh  grade. 
In  the  college,  household  economics  is  a  form  of 
technical  training.  In  the  Toledo  University  School 
the  amount  of  time  devoted  by  the  girls  to  domestic 
science  is  one  and  one-half  hours  per  day.  The 
course  is  practically  as  follows :  First  year,  plain 
sewing  and  free-hand  drawing  or  clay  modeling. 
Second  year,  cooking  and  free-hand  drawing,  clay 
modeling  or  wood  carving.  Third  year,  dressmak- 
ing and  free-hand  drawing,  clay  modeling  or  wood 
carving.  Fourth  year,  first  semester,  advanced 
cooking  or  dressmaking  and  free-hand  drawing, 
clay  modeling  or  wood  carving;  second  semester, 
millinery  and  free-hand  drawing,  wood  carving  or 
clay  modeling.  In  the  free-hand  drawing  depart- 
ment special  attention  is  given  to  house  decoration 
and  furnishing.  In  the  cooking  department  con- 
siderable time  is  devoted  to  the  selection  of  foods, 
food  values,  house  sanitation  and  allied  topics. 
Special  classes  are  arranged  for  adults.  Courses  in 
domestic  science  are  now  found  in  the  curricula  of 
many  institutions  of  college  grade,  particularly  in 
the  State  universities  and  <?tate  agricultural  colleges, 

m 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

Pratt  Institute  and  Teachers  College  (Columbia) 
conduct  courses  in  domestic  science.  In  the  depart- 
ment of  home  economics  at  the  University  of  Wis- 
consin among  the  courses  offered  are  the  following : 
House  sanitation,  house  decoration,  selection  and 
preparation  of  foods,  the  teaching  of  domestic 
science,  household  economy,  dietetics,  home  eco- 
nomics. One  professor  and  one  instructor  are  in 
charge  of  the  work. 

A  very  comprehensive  and  commendable  tentative 
program  for  the  teaching  of  household  arts  in  the 
elementary  schools  was  presented  by  a  committee 
to  the  Lake  Placid  Conference  on  Home  Economics 
in  1 90 1  The  following  is  an  abbreviated  outline 
of  that  program :  First  and  second  grades:  Mats 
and  baskets  of  raffia.  Simple  gifts.  Weave  small 
baskets.  Grind  and  parch  corn.  Make  cakes  of 
cornmeal.  Cook  fruits  and  roots.  Study  primitive 
life.  Nature  study.  Third  grade:  Make  banners 
and  tents  for  knights  and  sails  for  ships.  Make 
useful  articles  for  the  home,  such  as  cheese-cloth 
dusters,  dish  towels,  etc.  Advise  home  work. 
Make  table  cloths,  bed  spreads,  etc.,  for  a  model  of 
house.  Study  linen  and  silk.  Make  plain  bread. 
Cook  a  few  cereals.  Talk  about  proper  mastication. 
Cleanse  utensils.  Dust  room  and  desk.  Study 
decoration  of  model  of  house.  Study  age  of 
chivalry  and  age  of  adventure.  Talk  about  dirt, 
and  animal  and  vegetable  life.  Fourth  grade: 
Further  study  of  furnishing  and  construction  of 
model  of  house.  Simple  sewing.  Making  of  beds. 
Filter  and  boil  water.    Talk  about  water.    Cleanse 

m 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

glassware,  woodwork  and  paint.  Study  life  in 
early  settlements.  Fifth  grade:  Ventilation  and 
heating  of  schoolroom.  Ventilation  and  sunlight 
in  model  of  house.  Disposal  of  household  wastes. 
Sweeping  and  dusting.  Continue  sewing  and  bas- 
ketry. Study  of  air  and  heat.  Sixth  grade:  Sew- 
ing. Darning.  Patching.  Buttonholes.  Discussion 
of  clothing.  Seventh  grade:  More  advanced  sew- 
ing,— aprons,  skirts,  etc.  Study  leading  textile 
industries.  Economic  planning  and  cutting  of 
materials.  Price,  quality,  etc.,  of  materials.  Cook- 
ing. Study  of  stoves.  Make  fire.  Toast  bread. 
Bake  and  stew  apples,  etc.  Study  utensils.  Care 
of  refrigerators.  Clean  stoves  and  sinks.  Laundry 
towels,  etc.  Study  artificial  lighting.  Care  of  eyes 
and  sight.  Eighth  grade:  Food  materials,  where 
produced,  etc.  Action  of  heat,  cold,  fermentation, 
etc.  Study  effect  of  high  and  low  temperature 
processes  on  starch,  vegetable  fibres,  albuminoids, 
gelatine,  fat,  etc.,  as  shown  in  the  cooking  of  differ- 
ent articles.  Home  management.  Personal  and 
household  accounts.  Weighing  and  measuring. 
Plan  simple  meals.  Practice  setting  and  waiting 
on  table.  Simple  principles  of  balance  of  food. 
Simple  dishes  for  the  sick.  Care  of  dining  room. 
Talks  on  marketing. 

Such  a  course,  if  adopted,  would  offer  fine  oppor- 
tunities for  correlating  nature  study,  science,  in- 
dustrial evolution,  history,  geography,  arithmetic, 
simple  lessons  in  hygiene  and  sanitation,  and  manual 
training.  It  affords  a  rational  way  of  arousing  and 
retaining  the  interest  of  the  pupil  and  of  combining 
176 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

the  cultural  and  practical  in  an  indissoluble  union. 
The  demand  which  such  a  course  makes  upon 
teachers  is  not  small,  and  shows  clearly  the  necessity 
of  thorough  training, — a  training  of  a  somewhat 
different  nature  than  that  which  is  usually  given  in 
the  typical  normal  school  of  to-day. 

Mrs.  Linda  Hull  Larned,  sometime  president  of 
the  National  Household  Economic  Association, 
draws  a  distinction  between  the  character  of  the 
work  in  the  elementary  schools  and  in  the  high 
school  or  the  college.  "In  the  elementary  schools 
this  subject  is  called  domestic  science,  but  when  it 
reaches  the  high  school  or  college,  or  enters  the 
woman's  study  club,  it  is  household  economics, 
because  it  then  embraces  all  the  'ologies*  and  'isms' 
which  have  to  do  with  human  life,  as  well  as  those 
sentiments  and  emotions  which  cluster  about  the 
home.  In  this  higher  sense  then  it  is  not  only  the 
science  of  housewifery  practically  applied,  but  it  is 
the  esthetics  of  home  building  and  the  ethics  of 
home  making."  This  is  the  comprehensive  view 
held  by  the  enthusiastic  friends  of  domestic  science. 
Mrs.  Larned  presents  an  outline  for  an  advanced 
course  of  study.  The  chief  topics  considered  are 
food,  shelter,  clothing,  physical  hygiene,  municipal 
housekeeping,  household  expenditures,  home  handi- 
craft, household  management,  and  miscellaneous 
topics.  The  topic  shelter  is,  for  example,  sub- 
divided as  follows:  situation  and  structure  of 
house;  the  sanitary  cellar;  the  disposal  of  waste; 
investigation  of  modern  methods  of  lighting,  heat- 
ing, plumbing  and  ventilation;  decoration  and 
13  177 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

furnishing  from  the  standpoint  of  utility,  health 
and  beauty;  usefulness  or  uselessness  of  modern 
appliances  and  equipments ;  care  and  preservation 
of  household  furnishings  and  utensils. 

From  an  industrial  and  economic  point  of  view 
instruction  in  domestic  science  is  certainly  as 
important  as  instruction  in  any  other  form  of  indus- 
trial training.  The  introduction  of  domestic  science 
into  the  public-school  curriculum,  the  scientific  study 
of  food  values  and  of  sanitary  science,  the  wider 
outlook  and  the  broader  training  of  women,  are 
very  hopeful  signs  which  are  now  well  defined  upon 
the  horizon  of  the  American  educational  world. 
"Undoubtedly,  the  first  thing  to  be  taught  in  any 
school  is  the  science  of  health,  the  value  of  healthy 
homes,  of  pure  air  and  water,  proper  clothing, 
physical  exercise,  and,  above  all,  what  foods  are 
necessary  for  a  healthy  existence,  and  the  proper 
methods  of  cooking  these  foods."  "Food  is  the 
point  on  which  turns  the  whole  problem  of  democ- 
racy." Good  health  is  essential  to  the  welfare  and 
happiness  of  each  individual,  but  it  can  be  obtained 
and  preserved  only  by  the  fulfillment  of  certain 
elemental  conditions.  Proper  quantity  and  quality 
of  food  and  drink,  reasonable  cleanliness  of  person 
and  environment,  pure  air  both  day  and  night,  deep 
breathing,  work  and  rest,  are  some  of  the  essentials 
which  must  obtain  if  good  health  and  good  citizen- 
ship are  to  be  expected.  Ignorance  of  the  elemental 
requirements  for  good  health  is  the  root  of  many 
evils.  The  saloon,  the  drug  store,  patent  medicines, 
the  enormous  number  of  physicians,  and  the  high 
178 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

rate  of  infant  mortality  may  all  be  laid  primarily 
to  ignorance  and  blind  adherence  to  tradition. 
Education  can  best  combat  these  evils  through 
instruction  of  the  female  sex  in  domestic  science. 

Although  so  much  may  be  said  in  its  favor, 
domestic  science  still,  as  a  rule,  occupies  a  sub- 
ordinate place  in  our  school  curriculum;  and  when 
it  is  given  an  important  place,  in  many  cases  too 
much  attention  is  paid  to  expensive  dishes  and 
methods  of  serving,  and  to  the  furnishing  of  large 
and  costly  dwellings.  More  stress  should  be  laid 
upon  the  simple,  but  good  and  healthful.  The 
details  of  household  expenditures  should  be  studied, 
and  students  should  be  taught  economy  in  buying 
and  in  the  utilization  of  goods  for  household  con- 
sumption. Teachers  need  a  larger  knowledge  of 
the  home  conditions  and  environment  of  the  pupils. 
The  curriculum  and  the  methods  employed  ought, 
of  course,  to  be  adapted  to  the  needs  and  circum- 
stances of  the  pupils.  Until  this  is  recognized  by 
all  teachers  the  work  in  domestic  science  will  not 
reach  its  highest  efficiency. 

In  conclusion,  the  following  quotation  from  a 
daily  newspaper  may  not  be  amiss.  "Domestic 
science  is  by  far  the  most  important  of  all  sciences. 
It  is  also  the  oldest  of  them  all.  It  means  the  science 
of  cooking,  of  eating,  of  cleansing,  of  sleeping, — 
of  living.  Unless  people  do  these  things  correctly 
they  will  fall  sick.  And  when  they  are  sick  they 
become  unhappy  and  thus  make  those  around  them 
unhappy.  .  .  .  The  chief  obstacle  in  the  path  of 
domestic  science  has  always  been  lack  of  cooperation 
179 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

between  students.  The  knowledge  gained  by  the 
painful  and  mortifying  experience  of  one  woman  is 
not  shared  by  her  with  her  sisters.  They,  too,  have 
to  go  through  the  same  disagreeable  experiences  to 
find  out  the  same  things.  If  there  was  a  common 
fund  of  knowledge  into  which  all  new  discoveries 
might  be  put,  and  from  which  any  woman  might 
draw  the  accumulated  experience  of  centuries  and 
apply  it  to  her  own  present  dilemma,  much  needless 
toil  would  be  saved."  To  conserve  this  knowledge, 
to  add  to  it,  and  to  disseminate  it  are  the  chief 
functions  of  the  more  advanced  work  in  domestic 
science  or  home  economics. 

The  Trade  School 
Under  this  heading  schools  will  be  discussed 
which  have  for  their  chief  aim  the  teaching  of 
some  mechanical  trade  and  the  preparation  of 
their  students  for  a  place  in  the  ranks  of  skilled 
workers.  The  friends  of  the  trade  school  believe 
that  the  apprenticeship  system  is  no  longer  use- 
ful in  training  skilled  workers;  they  firmly  believe 
that  the  duty  of  training  such  artisans  must  here- 
after devolve  upon  the  school.  In  its  simplest 
form  the  trade  school  merely  tries  to  perform  the 
duties  of  the  old  apprenticeship  system.  The 
student  spends  nearly  all  of  his  time  in  the  work- 
shop. Skill  in  some  craft  is  the  sole  end  and  aim; 
this  sharply  differentiates  it  from  the  manual-train- 
ing school.  However,  some  of  the  more  recently 
established  trade  schools  are  lengthening  the  time 
of  instruction  and  aiming  to  give  their  graduates  a 
i8o 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

broader  training, — something  more  than  a  purely 
technical  training. 

The  New  York  Trade  School  is  the  oldest  and 
perhaps  the  best  representative  of  the  original  type 
of  trade  school.  This  school  is  said  to  be  the  largest 
and  best-equipped  trade  school  in  the  United  States. 
It  was  founded  in  1881  by  Col.  R.  T.  Auchmuty. 
The  cost  of  land,  buildings  and  equipment  was 
about  $300,000,  and  the  cost  of  maintenance  is  about 
$33,000  per  year.  Both  day  and  evening  classes  are 
maintained.  The  school  year  is  six  months  in 
length.  The  day  classes  meet  six  days  per  week, 
and  the  evening  classes  two  to  four  times  each 
week.  The  method  of  instruction  was  originated 
by  Col.  Auchmuty.  "At  first  the  student  is  put  on 
work  that  is  simple,  but  as  skill  and  workmanlike 
use  of  tools  are  acquired  he  is  advanced  to  work 
that  is  more  difficult  and  complicated  until  he  is 
made  familiar  with  the  various  branches  of  his 
trade."  Emphasis  is  laid  upon  actual  practice,  and 
very  little  attention  is  paid  to  theoretical  or  scientific 
training.     The  instructors  are  skilled  mechanics. 

The  Wilmerding  School  of  Industrial  Arts  of  San 
Francisco,  California,  is  a  good  example  of  the 
later  type  of  the  trade  school.  Mr.  J.  C.  Wilmer- 
ding bequeathed  the  sum  of  $400,000  to  establish 
and  maintain  a  school  "to  teach  boys  trades,  fitting 
them  to  make  a  living  with  their  hands  with  little 
study  and  plenty  of  work."  This  school  was  opened 
in  1899  and  has  well-equipped  shops.  The  latest 
and  best  shop  appliances  are  used.  It  devotes  its 
attention  chiefly  to  the  building  trades,  while  the 
181 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

California  School  of  Mechanical  Art  in  the  same 
city  turns  its  attention  to  the  machinery  trades. 
In  addition  to  the  practical  work  the  Wilmerding 
School  gives  instruction  in  drawing,  mathematics, 
English,  business  forms,  geography,  history  and 
civics.  "It  is  intended  that  the  graduates  of  the 
school  shall  be  well-instructed  workmen  in  the 
trades  which  they  select,  and  intelligent  citizens." 
A  four-years'  course  is  given.  No  tuition  is 
charged.  Any  boy  is  admitted  who  has  completed 
the  work  given  in  the  ward  schools.  The  instruct- 
ors in  the  academic  departments  are  college  grad- 
uates and  the  shop  instructors  are  skilled  artisans. 
By  contrasting  these  two  schools  we  see  that  much 
progress  has  been  made  in  regard  to  the  methods, 
aims  and  purpose  of  trade  education.  The  Wil- 
merding School  recognizes  that  the  workingman 
is  to  be  a  citizen  as  well  as  an  artisan.  It  empha- 
sizes the  necessity  for  a  broader  and  more  thorough 
training  than  can  be  given  by  means  of  a  short, 
purely  practical  course  of  instruction.  The  best 
bricklayer  is  not  the  one  who  merely  knows  how 
to  lay  the  wall  and  mix  the  mortar,  but  the  one 
who  adds  to  this  an  understanding  of  the  require- 
ments of  citizenship  in  a  democratic  country. 

In  New  England  and  the  South  many  textile 
schools  are  found.  This  form  of  trade  school  is  a 
comparatively  recent  departure.  In  1895  Massachu- 
setts passed  an  act  authorizing  the  granting  of  state 
aid  for  the  establishment  of  such  schools,  to  the 
extent  of  $25,000,  provided  the  municipality  would 
g^ant  an  equal  sum.  The  provisions  of  this  act 
182 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

were  limited  to  cities  having  at  least  450,000 
spindles.  Under  this  act  the  Lowell,  New  Bedford 
and  Fall  River  textile  schools  were  organized.  In 
the  South  there  are  textile  departments  in  Clemson 
College,  the  North  Carolina  College  of  Agriculture 
and  Mechanical  Arts,  the  Georgia  School  of  Tech- 
nology and  the  Mississippi  Agricultural  and 
Mechanical  College.  The  typical  course  is  three 
years  in  length,  with  courses  in  cotton  manufacture, 
wool  manufacture,  designing,  chemistry,  dyeing  and 
weaving. 

The  tendency  of  trade  and  textile  schools  is 
toward  higher  entrance  requirements  and  broader 
curricula.  The  textile  instruction  in  the  Georgia 
School  of  Technology  is  dignified  by  the  name  of 
textile  engineering,  and  is  made  coordinate  with  the 
other  branches  of  engineering, — civil,  mechanical 
and  electrical.  The  graduates  in  textile  engineering 
receive  the  degree  of  bachelor  of  science.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  technical  school,  while  not  reduc- 
ing its  requirements,  is  trying  to  adhere  more  closely 
to  the  practical  demands  of  the  engineering  and 
industrial  world.  This  may  finally  bring  it  to  pass 
that  the  distinction  between  trade  and  technical 
education  will  become  one  of  degree  rather  than  of 
kind.  As  manual  training  has  forced  its  way  into 
the  public-school  curriculum,  and  as  technical  edu- 
cation is  now  provided  by  state  colleges  of  agricul- 
ture and  mechanical  arts,  so  finally  will  a  broad 
preparation  for  the  skilled  trades  find  a  place  in 
our  scheme  of  public  education. 
183 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

"Self-Supporting"  or  Half-Time  Schools 
The  attempt  to  closely  unite  education  and  labor 
has  brought  forth  a  kind  of  school  which  has  at  dif- 
ferent periods  been  called  "manual-labor,"  "half- 
time"  or  "people's  industrial"  schools.  In  the  earlier 
forms  the  method  employed  or  proposed  was  simple. 
The  student  was  furnished  with  work  in  a  shop  or 
on  a  farm.  One  half  of  his  time  was  devoted  to  prac- 
tical work,  thus  enabling  him  to  pay  his  expenses; 
the  other  portion  of  his  time  was  utilized  in  study. 
The  "manual-labor"  schools  organized  in  New  York 
State,  in  the  period  1825-1850,  were  of  this  char- 
acter. The  Oneida  Institute  was  one  of  the  first 
established.  All  of  these  attempts  soon  resulted  in 
failure.  A  manual-labor  department  was  estab- 
lished early  in  the  history  of  Oberlin  College. 
According  to  a  circular  issued  by  the  institution, 
manual  labor  was  considered  indispensable  to  a 
complete  education  and  necessary  for  the  preserva- 
tion of  the  student's  health.  Saw  mills,  grist  mills 
and  other  establishments  were  operated  upon  a 
commercial  basis;  but  eventually  the  enterprises 
proved  to  be  failures.  Professor  Commons  observes : 
"Not  even  the  most  enthusiastic  modern  advocate 
of  manual-training  schools  as  a  solution  of  the  edu- 
cational problem  could  have  set  forth  more  glow- 
ingly the  advantages  of  this  system."  All  were 
required  to  work,  rich  and  poor  alike,  because  it 
gave  the  student  exercise  while  defraying  his 
expenses,  because  it  aided  in  forming  habits  of 
frugality  and  of  industry,  because  it  furnished  an 
acquaintance  with  the  common  things  of  life,  and 
184 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

because  it  met  the  wants  of  man  as  a  compound 
being.  The  more  recent  proposal  of  Mr.  M.  P. 
Higgins  is  a  sort  of  modern  revival  of  this  older 
idea.  He  proposes  to  join  a  well-equipped  machine 
shop,  operated  on  a  commercial  basis,  with  the 
ordinary  technical  school.  The  students  would  work 
one  half  of  the  time  in  the  shop  under  practical  shop 
conditions  and  discipline.  Expert  machinists  would 
be  employed  to  oversee  the  work.  Mr.  Higgins 
believes  that  in  this  manner  all  the  benefits  of  the 
best  form  of  apprenticeship  would  be  retained,  and, 
at  the  same  time,  thorough  scientific  and  technical 
instruction  would  be  given  to  the  workers.  The 
"self-supporting"  school  is  diametrically  opposed  to 
the  traditional  monastic  ideal  of  the  college.  It 
reverses  the  Aristotelian  dogma  that  leisure  is 
necessary  for  education  and  culture,  and  proclaims 
that  only  through  work  and  activity  is  a  person 
enabled  to  achieve  true  education  and  culture  in 
modern  society. 

Correspondence  Instruction 
The  almost  phenomenal  development  of  corre- 
spondence instruction  is  a  fact  to  which  the  educator 
should  give  thoughtful  attention.  Correspondence 
instruction  is  now  offered  in  almost  every  con- 
ceivable branch  of  knowledge, — law,  journalism, 
art,  languages,  science,  drafting,  engineering, 
physics,  domestic  science,  music  and  nursing  are  a 
few  of  the  many  subjects  which  different  institu- 
tions claim  to  teach  by  mail.  The  kind  of  "schools" 
giving  correspondence  instruction  vary  from  the 
185 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

individual,  at  one  end  of  the  line,  who  aims  to  make 
money  easily  by  advertising  to  give  this  instruction, 
to  such  large  and  reliable  institutions  as  the  Uni- 
versity of  Chicago  and  the  University  of  Wisconsin 
at  the  other. 

Dr.  William  R.  Harper,  the  late  president  of  the 
University  of  Chicago,  is  said  to  be  the  father  of 
modern  correspondence  instruction  in  the  United 
States.  In  1880  he  instituted  a  correspondence 
course  in  Hebrew.  From  1885  to  1895  Chautauqua 
Institute  employed  this  method  to  some  extent.  In 
1892  the  University  of  Chicago  made  correspond- 
ence instruction  a  feature  of  its  university  extension 
work.  In  the  early  nineties  the  now  familiar  private 
technical  correspondence  schools  began  to  be 
founded.  Among  the  chief  schools  of  the  latter 
class  may  be  mentioned  the  International  Corre- 
spondence Schools,  Scranton,  Pennsylvania;  the 
American  Schools  of  Correspondence,  Boston,  the 
Correspondence  Department  of  the  Armour  Insti- 
tute, Chicago;  and  the  Electrical  Engineer's  In- 
stitute of  Correspondence  Instruction,  New  York. 
The  Scranton  school,  which  is  one  of  the  oldest  of 
its  kind,  recently  claimed  an  enrollment  of  over 
300,000  students.  The  average  age  of  students  is 
about  twenty-six  years;  and  more  than  eighty  per 
cent,  know  nothing  of  fractions  when  they  begin. 

The  questions  naturally  arise:  What  has  caused 
this  enormous  growth  of  correspondence  instruc- 
tion? Is  it  a  permanent  or  a  temporary  feature  of 
education?  The  demand  for  technical  and  practical 
instruction  is  due  to  the  new  industrial  conditions 
186 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

upon  which  so  much  stress  has  been  placed  in  pre- 
vious chapters.  This  demand  has  so  far  outrun  the 
abiHty  or  the  inclination  of  the  school  authorities  to 
meet  it  that  extraordinary  measures  must  be  resorted 
to.  The  demand  existed ;  the  correspondence  school 
arose  to  meet  it,  and  to  increase  it  as  well,  because 
the  typical  correspondence  school  is  merely  a  busi- 
ness proposition.  The  correspondence  schools  have 
taken  advantage  of  the  fact  that  a  man  is  always 
interested  in  his  own  occupation;  they  have  firmly 
grasped  the  fact  that  he  will  study  if  he  can  be 
convinced  that  by  so  doing  he  will  reap  the  reward 
of  increased  wages  in  the  near  future.  One  favorite 
motto  used  in  advertisements  is:  "To  earn  more, 
learn  more."  Their  advertisements  usually  contain 
statements  from  their  students  as  to  increased 
salary.  These  schools  have  been  successful  in 
obtaining  thousands  of  students  because  they  have 
given,  in  a  simple  and  direct  manner,  what  the 
pupils  need,  and  because  they  have  placed  before 
the  prospective  student  the  direct,  immediate,  con- 
crete result  of  study  in  their  school,  namely,  an 
increase  in  wages.  They  have  taught  the  orthodox 
economic  doctrine  that  increased  efficiency  leads  to 
higher  wages.  The  private  correspondence  school 
thrives  through  good  advertising  and  soliciting,  and 
because  it  ostensibly  furnishes  the  "goods"  which 
the  people  demand, — goods  which  are  unfortunately 
as  yet  not  adequately  furnished  elsewhere. 

Some    private    correspondence    schools    may    be 
"fakes";  the  methods  employed  and  the  aims  placed 
before  the  student  may  not  be  of  the  best ;  but  they 
187 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

have  a  mission  and  some  are  doing  a  good  work- 
A  solicitor  of  one  correspondence  school  once  told 
the  author  that  the  company  made  its  profits,  as  did 
old-line  insurance  companies,  from  the  students  who 
purchased  full-course  scholarships,  and  who  soon 
dropped  out.  He  said  that  he  was  often  obliged 
to  urge  men  to  enroll  who,  he  felt  sure,  would  not 
profit  by  the  work,  and  who  would  soon  drop  out. 
But  the  company  looked  to  him  for  concrete  results, 
and  his  salary  depended  upon  the  numbers  enrolled. 
With  the  establishment  of  well-organized  evening 
instruction  in  our  cities  and  towns  the  demand  for 
correspondence  instruction  will  probably  diminish 
or  be  changed  in  character.  It  may  then  be  devoted 
chiefly  to  work  of  a  higher  grade,  similar  to  that 
given  in  a  college  or  technical  school.  In  some 
form  it  seems  probable  that  this  kind  of  instruction 
is  to  continue;  but  the  private,  organized- for-profit 
correspondence  school  should  be  supplanted  by  the 
public  school.  One  State  University,  Wisconsin, 
has  already  gone  into  this  work  on  a  large  scale. 

The  success  of  this  new  method  of  instruction 
also  has  its  lesson  for  the  student  of  educational 
problems.  It  makes  it  clear  that  when  the  student 
cannot  go  to  the  school  or  to  the  university,  these 
must  be  brought  to  him.  This  lesson  is  already 
bearing  fruit  such  as  university  extension,  farmers' 
institutes,  good  roads  object  lessons  and  the  train 
schools  for  farmers.  The  institution  of  learning 
of  the  future  will  not  be  solely  devoted  to  the  little 
band  of  fortunate  individuals  who  can  gather  in  its 
halls,  but  will  become  a  center  from  which  learning 
i88 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

and  practical  aid  will  be  disseminated  through  cor- 
respondence courses,  university-extension  work, 
special  classes,  bulletins,  leaflets  and  books  to  a  vast 
number  of  toilers  in  classrooms,  factories,  offices, 
stores  and  on  farms.  The  aim  will  be  to  make  all 
students,  wherever  they  may  be  and  under  whatever 
conditions  they  may  live.  Instruction  ought  to  be 
so  given  as  to  meet  the  wants  and  fit  the  ability  of 
the  various  kinds  and  classes  of  students  and 
workers.  The  correspondence  schools  have  fur- 
nished text-books  which  are  far  superior,  for  the 
use  of  the  class  of  students  for  whom  they  were 
designed,  to  any  written  by  the  average  professional 
text-book  writer.  The  text-book  ought  to  fit  the 
student,  instead  of  requiring  the  adjustment  of  the 
student  to  it.  Different  styles  of  treatment  are 
necessary  for  the  same  subject.  Pedagogical 
requirements  must  by  no  means  be  overlooked, — 
and  by  adopting  this  method  they  may  be  truly 
followed  and  emphasized.  No  hard  and  fast  peda- 
gogical method  can  be  applied  effectively  and 
economically  to  individuals  of  widely  dissimilar 
home,  class  and  professional  environment.  To 
furnish  the  proper  material  in  the  proper  form  to 
each  individual,  is  the  problem.  The  correspond- 
ence school  has  made  progress  in  this  direction. 

The  correspondence  school  allows  each  individual 
to  progress  just  as  fast  as  he  is  able;  the  class 
method  is  avoided.  There  is  no  holding  back  or 
crowding  ahead.  On  account  of  this  feature  it 
seems  as  if  something  might  be  done  in  an  organ- 
ized, systematic  way  toward  utilizing  the  leisure 
189 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

time  of  men  engaged  in  seasonal  industries,  as,  for 
example,  the  farmer's  time  during  bad  weather, 
and  the  mechanic's  time  when  he  is  temporarily  laid 
oflf.  If  suitable  reading  and  opportunity  for 
instruction  by  correspondence  or  otherwise  were 
offered,  and  the  case  presented  in  a  businesslike 
way,  the  disadvantages  and  dangers  of  irregularity 
of  work  might  be  partially  removed.  The  diffi- 
culties in  the  road  are  great,  but  the  need  is  also 
urgent. 

The  International  Correspondence  School  offers 
nearly  half  a  hundred  courses  in  technical  instruc- 
tion. The  following  are  selected  from  the  list  to 
illustrate  the  great  variety  of  instruction  attempted : 
shopkeepers'  course,  electrical  engineers'  course, 
telegraphy,  mechanical  drawing,  building  contrac- 
tors' course,  municipal  engineering,  sanitary  plumb- 
ing, lettering  and  sign  painting,  coal-mining  course. 
A  synopsis  of  the  coal-mining  course  will  give  an 
idea  of  the  extent  of  the  work.  This  course  is 
designed  to  fit  the  needs  of  mining  engineers,  miners 
and  mine  officials.  It  aims  to  present  to  the  student 
every  detail  which  is  necessary  to  fit  him  for  any 
position  in  the  anthracite  or  bituminous  fields,  or  to 
pass  the  examinations  for  mine  foreman  or  state 
inspector  of  mines.  The  subjects  taught  in  this 
course  are  arithmetic,  geometrical  drawing,  geome- 
try and  trigonometry,  gases  met  with  in  mining, 
mine  ventilation,  mine  surveying  and  mapping, 
economic  geology  of  coal,  prospecting  for  coal, 
locations  of  openings,  shafts,  slopes  and  drifts, 
methods  of  working  coal  mines,  mechanics,  steam 
190 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

and  steam  boilers,  steam-engines,  air  and  air  com- 
pressors, hydro-mechanics  and  pumping,  mine 
haulage,  hojsting  and  hoisting  appliances,  surface 
arrangements  of  anthracite  and  bituminous  mines, 
coal-cutting  machinery,  dynamos  and  motors,  elec- 
tric pumping,  signaling,  haulage  and  lighting.  Cer- 
tainly, this  is  an  ambitious,  comprehensive  and 
practical  course.  Can  such  a  course  be  properly 
and  thoroughly  given  by  correspondence  methods? 
Undoubtedly,  in  the  majority  of  cases,  not  as  well 
as  in  a  good  night  or  continuation  school;  but  the 
correspondence  method  reaches  the  student  where- 
ever  he  may  be.  This  is  its  great  merit.  Its 
facilities  are  equally  at  the  command  of  all  whom 
the  postal  service  reaches. 

In  recent  years  household  economics  is  claiming 
a  place  in  correspondence  instruction.  A  corre- 
spondence school  announces  a  "complete  course  in 
household  economics."  "This  course,"  their  cata- 
logue announces,  "is  intended  for  the  home-maker, 
mother  or  daughter,  who  desires  fuller  knowledge 
of  the  subjects  required  to  make  her  work  more 
interesting,  her  management  more  efficient  and  her 
home-making  more  successful."  Lesson  papers 
will  be  sent  to  the  student  on  the  following  subjects : 
chemistry  of  the  household,  household  bacteriology, 
house  sanitation,  food  and  dietetics,  scientific  prin- 
ciples of  cookery,  the  house, — its  plan,  decoration 
and  care, — household  management,  home  care  of 
the  sick,  study  of  child  life,  care  of  children,  textiles 
and  clothing,  physiology  and  hygiene.  In  the  les- 
sons on  the  care  of  children,  which  are  written  by  a 
191 


INDUSTRIAL     EVOLUTION 

professor  In  a  well-known  medical  college,  the 
following  are  the  chief  topics  treated :  the  new-born 
baby,  clothing,  surroundings  and  care,  development 
and  growth,  natural  and  other  foods,  artificial  feed- 
ing, milk  modification,  milk  and  food  formulae, 
general  rules  for  feeding,  food  disorders,  feeding 
during  second  year,  feeding  of  older  children,  chil- 
dren's ailments. 

The  Negro  Industrial  School 
The  immigrant  furnishes  many  complex  and 
difficult  industrial,  social  and  educational  problems 
for  the  people  of  the  North,  and  the  negro  fills  a 
similar  role  in  the  South.  The  Civil  War  and  the 
former  prevalence  of  slavery  delayed  industrial 
development  in  this  important  section  of  the  country. 
During  the  last  quarter  of  a  century,  however,  a 
new  industrial  South  has  been  developed.  Cotton 
factories  and  blast  furnaces  are  being  built,  and 
busy  industrial  villages  are  supplanting  the  old- 
fashioned  towns.  In  the  twenty  years  from  1880 
to  1900  the  number  of  cotton  factories  increased 
about  fourfold.  Agricultural  progress  has  kept 
pace  with  the  industrial  development.  This  rapid, 
almost  unprecedented,  growth  has  emphasized  the 
need  of  new  educational  methods.  The  southern 
people  are  now  awake  to  the  necessity  of  technical 
and  industrial  training  for  both  white  and  black. 
President  Winston,  of  the  North  Carolina  College 
of  Agriculture  and  Mechanic  Arts,  voices  the  senti- 
ment thus :  "The  South  needs  workers,  trained  and 
skilled  workers,  in  every  department  of  industry. 
192 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

Rude  labor  will  not  suffice,  even  in  agriculture. 
Our  cotton  crop  has  been  trebled  in  thirty  years. 
Improvements  in  cultivation,  in  machinery,  in  fer- 
tilizers, and  in  utilization  of  waste  products  have 
produced  this  wonderful  result.  The  methods  of 
slavery  would  mean  bankruptcy.  Thirty  years 
hence  our  crops  will  be  trebled  again,  and  the 
methods  of  to-day  will  mean  bankruptcy  then. 
The  same  is  true  of  all  our  industries."  In  other 
sections  the  growth  of  technical  and  textile  schools 
for  the  whites  of  the  North  and  the  South  has  been 
presented;  it  remains  for  this  section  to  point  out 
the  industrial  position  and  the  educational  needs 
of  the  negro. 

"The  negro  now  has  a  monopoly  of  the  trades  in 
the  South,  but  he  can't  hold  it  unless  the  young 
men  are  taught  trades  in  the  school."  This  true 
prophecy  was  uttered  by  Booker  T.  Washington  in 
1884.  The  census  of  1900  proved  conclusively, 
what  common  observation  had  led  many  to  believe, 
namely,  that  the  negro  is  fast  losing  his  position  in 
the  trades.  Many  different  reasons  may  be  given 
for  this  phenomenon,  such  as  the  unreliability  and 
irregularity  of  the  negro,  race  antagonism,  oppo- 
sition of  the  labor  unions.  Mr.  Washington  is  still 
firm  in  his  conviction  as  to  the  value  of  negro  indus- 
trial education ;  but  some  are  skeptical.  One  writer 
states :  "It  would  be  almost  useless  to  equip  a  con- 
siderable number  of  colored  men  with  the  mechan- 
ical trades,  for  they  could  find  no  opportunity  to 
ply  them.'*  Continuing,  he  argues  that  the  negro 
is  not  driven  out  of  the  trades  because  he  is 
13  193 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

unskilful ;  "but  it  is  simply  a  case  of  the  stronger 
element  driving  the  weaker  to  the  wall."  The 
problem  of  the  negro  is  an  extreme  type  of  the  race 
problem  which  immigration  has  laid  at  the  door  of 
every  large  city ;  and  the  negro  himself  is  becoming 
a  factor  in  the  city  problem.  The  negro  population 
of  the  United  States  seems  to  be  moving  toward 
the  larger  cities  on  the  one  hand,  and  toward  the 
Gulf  States  on  the  other.  The  negro  is  like  a  child ; 
he  lacks  the  centuries  of  training  in  self-reliance 
and  initiative  which  is  the  heritage  of  more  fortu- 
nate races.  Slavery  tended  to  eliminate  the  virtues 
which  modern  civilization  holds  most  dear.  The 
problem  here,  as  in  the  case  of  every  race  having 
a  low  standard  of  living  and  existing  on  a  low 
plane  of  morality  and  economic  efficiency,  is  that  of 
a  gradual  improvement  in  those  conditions.  An 
abrupt,  rapid  transformation  of  the  race  as  a  whole 
cannot  be  anticipated.  The  negro  is  among  us ;  he 
cannot  be  removed,  nor  can  he  be  excluded  as  are 
the  Chinese.  Just  as  long  as  he  remains  as  he  now 
is,  will  he  be  a  menace  to  all  higher  classes  of  labor. 
If  the  race  becomes  fitted  for  a  position  in  the 
industrial  world,  if  its  members  become  capable  of 
being  independent  producers,  it  will  find  its  proper 
place  in  the  complex  industrial  life  of  to-day.  As 
Professor  Commons  has  pointed  out,  the  funda- 
mental educational  principles  which  apply  to  the 
undeveloped  races  are  mechanical  aptitude,  thrift 
and  accumulation  of  property,  and  mutual  self- 
help.  The  second  of  these  principles  may  be 
difficult  of  realization  under  modern  industrial  con- 
194 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

ditions,  but  the  first  and  third  we  may  hope  to 
apply.  Purely  intellectual  training,  the  study  of 
literature  and  the  classics,  to  the  exclusion  of  science 
and  manual  training,  merely  unfits  the  negro  for 
any  accessible  and  useful  position  in  life.  The  evil 
effects  of  such  training  in  a  modern  industrial  coun- 
try are  here  exhibited  in  their  most  aggravated 
form.  If  manual  training,  domestic  science  and 
industrial  education  are  extremely  desirable  fea- 
tures in  the  education  of  the  whites,  surely  every 
fair-minded  and  unprejudiced  thinker  must  grant 
that  they  are  essential  for  this  comparatively  unde- 
veloped negro  race. 

The  negro  industrial  schools  of  the  South  have 
grasped  the  true  spirit  of  industrial  education  more 
firmly  than  many  northern  schools.  Such  schools 
as  the  Hampton  Institute  and  the  Tuskegee  Institute 
can  teach  many  lessons  to  the  educators  connected 
with  schools  for  the  whites.  For  example,  the 
principal  of  Hampton  Institute,  where  negroes  and 
Indians  are  educated  together,  observes :  "When 
they  come  into  the  school,  we  do  not  put  them  into 
books,  we  take  them  to  our  laboratory.  For 
instance,  every  boy  and  girl  is  put  into  the  chemical 
laboratory  and  the  physical  laboratory,  where  they 
get  the  first  principles  of  these  things  so  that  they 
shall  know  something  about  air  and  water  and  soil. 
Then  they  begin  to  write  about  these  things,  and 
they  begin  to  talk  about  them,  and  then  gradually 
we  introduce  them  to  books ;  but  we  put  the  doing 
of  the  thing  first  all  the  way  through."  If  Hughes 
of  Toronto  and  Dewey  of  Columbia  are  excepted, 
J95 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

we  shall  look  long  and  earnestly  before  finding 
educators  of  the  white  race  who  have  made  such 
progress  in  the  theory  of  education.  The  Hampton 
Normal  and  Agricultural  School  was  founded  by  a 
northern  man,  General  S.  C.  Armstrong,  at  Hamp- 
ton, Virginia,  in  1868.  This  institution  has  been 
the  model  for  the  other  industrial  schools  for  the 
colored  race.  Booker  T.  Washington  has  been 
greatly  influenced  by  the  ideals  of  the  Hampton 
Institute.  "The  work  of  Hampton  Institute,"  he 
writes,  "has  not  only  resulted  in  turning  the  atten- 
tion of  the  negro  population  to  the  importance  of 
industrial  education,  but  has  had  a  marked  influence 
in  shaping  the  education  of  the  white  South  in  the 
same  direction." 

The  representative  institution  of  to-day  is  the 
Tuskegee  Institute,  of  which  Booker  T.  Washington 
is  the  principal;  and  a  study  of  it  will  be  best  for 
our  present  purpose.  It  was  opened  in  1881,  as 
the  practical  result  of  an  appropriation  of  $2,000 
by  the  legislature  of  Alabama  for  the  education  of 
colored  boys  and  girls.  Since  1883  the  state  has 
allowed  it  an  annual  appropriation  of  $3,000; 
recently  $1,500  additional  has  been  allowed  annually 
for  the  support  of  an  agricultural  experiment 
station.  The  school  opened  in  a  small  church  with 
an  instructional  force  of  one,  and  thirty  pupils; 
at  present  it  owns  about  2,500  acres  of  land,  pos- 
sesses about  half  a  hundred  buildings,  employs  over 
seventy-five  instructors,  and  gives  instruction  to  at 
least  one  thousand  young  men  and  women.  The 
annual  cost  of  maintaining  the  institution  is  at  least 
196 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

$75,000.  This  sum  is  derived  from  various  sources, 
such  as  state  appropriations,  an  endowment  fund 
made  up  of  federal  land  grants,  and  gifts  and 
bequests  of  friends  of  the  school,  donations,  and 
tuition  fees  from  students.  These  fees  are  an 
entrance  fee  of  $1.50,  and  room  and  board  amount- 
ing to  about  $8  per  month.  Both  day  and  night 
schools  are  maintained;  the  latter  is  for  students 
who  are  too  poor  to  pay  the  entrance  fee  and  their 
board.  They  are  given  opportunities  to  work  for 
their  board  and  room.  Those  taking  day  work  pay 
their  board  and  devote  their  entire  time  to  study, 
excepting  for  six  work  days  in  each  month;  on 
these  days  they  are  required  to  work.  "The  use 
of  intoxicating  drinks  and  tobacco  is  forbidden,  as 
are  also  dice  playing  and  card  playing.  Students 
are  not  permitted,  while  in  school,  to  take  part  in 
any  political  mass  meeting  or  convention."  The 
course  of  study  is  four  years  in  length.  In  assigning 
trades  to  men  students,  the  student's  intelligence, 
natural  ability  and  physical  capabitities  are  given 
careful  consideration.  Both  literary  and  trade 
instruction  are  given  to  each  student. 

The  following  trade  courses  are  given:  agricul- 
tural courses  for  young  men,  dairying,  market  gar- 
dening, practical  agriculture,  stock  raising,  bee 
culture,  horticulture,  free-hand  drawing,  carpentry, 
blacksmithing,  printing,  wheelwrighting,  harness 
making  and  carriage  trimming,  painting,  plumbing 
and  foundry  work,  machine-shop  practice,  shoe- 
making,  brickmasonry  and  plastering,  brickmaking, 
sawmilling,  tinsmithing,  tailoring,  plain  sewing, 
197 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

dressmaking,  millinery,  cooking,  laundering,  nurse 
training,  housekeeping,  mattress  making  and  uphol- 
stering, canning,  architectural  and  mechanical 
drawing.  This  mstitution  is  a  large  trade  school 
of  a  type  similar  to  the  Wilmerding  school.  It 
combines  theory  and  practice.  Actual  practice  is 
given  on  the  farm  and  in  the  shops.  All  the  brick- 
work and  plastering  of  the  buildings  belonging  to 
the  school  have  been  done  by  students.  Harnesses 
are  made  both  for  use  at  the  school  and  for  sale. 
Consequently,  in  many  respects  it  is  also  similar  to 
the  school  proposed  by  Mr.  Higgins. 

Apprenticeship  in  the  United  States* 
The  apprentice  working  side  by  side  with  a  jour- 
neyman who  is  skilled  in  all  branches  of  the  work 
of  his  craft  is  rarely  found  at  the  present  time.  The 
methods  employed  in  the  modern  shop  have  reduced 
the  number  of  all-round  men ;  and,  at  the  same  time, 
have  made  the  adequate  instruction  of  beginners  a 
burden  for  the  journeyman.  To  become  skilled  in 
more  than  some  simple,  minute  class  of  work,  the 
learner  must  be  transferred  from  journeyman  to 
journeyman,  from  department  to  department,  from 
machine  to  machine.  At  the  moment  when  the 
apprentice  becomes  proficient  in  any  particular  class 
of  work,  or  in  the  operation  of  some  machine,  he 
should  be  transferred  to  some  other  class  of  work, 
or  other  machine.  However,  the  personal  interests 
of  the  foreman,  and  the  immediate  considerations  of 

*  See  article  by  the  author   in  Cassier's  Magazine,  April, 
1905. 

198 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

profit  and  of  output,  lead  a  foreman  to  keep  a  boy 
continually  upon  one  class  of  work  rather  than  to 
transfer  him  at  the  proper  psychological  and  peda- 
gogical moment  to  other  kinds  of  work.  The  fore- 
man is  naturally  more  interested  in  the  production 
of  machines  to-day  than  in  the  training  of  boys  who 
are  to  become  skilled  workers  at  some  indefinite 
future  time.  The  apprentice,  like  the  average 
immigrant  of  recent  decades,  is  an  unskilled,  low- 
wage  worker.  The  constant  temptation  of  the 
employer,  in  the  face  of  competition  and  the  ever- 
constant  demand  for  more  profits,  is  to  subdivide 
the  work  in  his  establishment  and  pass  certain 
portions  on  to  the  apprentice,  exactly  as  has  been 
done  in  the  case  of  the  immigrant.  Where  this  is 
accomplished  or  where  no  apprenticeship  system  is 
established,  the  apprentice  receives  no  adequate 
instruction ;  and  sooner  or  later  the  quality  of  work 
done  in  that  shop  inevitably  deteriorates,  unless 
there  exist  outside  sources  from  which  a  supply 
of  skilled  workers  may  be  drawn.  Such  an  indus- 
try becomes  parasitic.  In  the  past  Europe  and  the 
small  shop  furnished  a  considerable  portion  of  the 
foremen  and  skilled  men  in  our  large  shops. 
To-day  it  is  believed  that  these  sources  are  drying 
up,  and,  as  a  consequence,  the  apprenticeship  ques- 
tion is  now  important. 

Temporary  expediency  is  unfavorable  to  the 
introduction  and  maintenance  of  a  thorough  appren- 
ticeship system ;  but  when  an  establishment  looks 
several  years  ahead  the  question  assumes  a  totally 
different  aspect.  With  the  growth  of  the  corporate 
199 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

method  in  industry,  calculations  for  many  years  in 
the  future  become  habitual;  and  as  a  result  more 
consideration  is  being  given  to  the  labor  side  of  each 
industry.  Apprenticeship  is  desirable  chiefly  for 
two  reasons:  to  furnish  an  adequate  supply  of 
skilled  men,  and  to  maintain  and  improve  the  char- 
acter and  efficiency  of  workers.  Manufacturers 
cannot  afford  as  a  business  proposition,  all  ethical 
and  philanthropic  considerations  aside,  to  neglect 
suitable  provisions  for  teaching  apprentices.  If  the 
United  States  is  to  maintain  its  present  high  rank 
as  an  industrial  nation  provision  must  be  made  for 
a  future  supply  of  trained  and  skilled  workers.  It 
has  frequently  been  stated  that  the  old  form  of 
apprenticeship  has  passed  out  of  existence;  this 
statement  is  probably  correct,  but  a  new  form  of 
apprenticeship  is  rapidly  coming  into  being. 

Within  the  last  ten  or  twelve  years  tv/o  important 
private  investigations  have  been  made  as  to  the 
prevalency  of  apprenticeship  in  the  machine  shops 
of  this  country.  In  the  first  inquiry  it  was  found 
that  85  out  of  a  total  of  116  shops  investigated — 
builders  of  engines  and  pumps,  tool  builders, 
railroad  shops  and  locomotive  shops,  and  miscel- 
laneous machinery  builders — took  apprentices.  In 
the  second  inquiry  it  was  found  that  73  out  of  a 
total  of  112  shops  took  apprentices.  Railroad  shops 
and  locomotive  builders  are  most  strongly  committed 
to  this  policy ;  22  out  of  25  investigated  took  appren- 
tices. In  the  shops  having  the  most  advanced  and 
commendable  systems,  night-school  work  or  cor- 
respondence instruction  is  required  of  apprentices. 
200 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

A  foreman  of  apprentices  is  also  employed.  It  is 
his  duty  to  see  that  the  young  men  have  proper 
instruction,  and  that  they  are  promptly  advanced 
from  department  to  department.  The  Baldwin 
Locomotive  Works,  Philadelphia;  Brown  and 
Sharpe  Manufacturing  Company,  Providence;  The 
Westinghouse  Company,  Pittsburg;  The  General 
Electric  Company,  Schenectady ;  and  Hoe  and  Com- 
pany, New  York,  are  among  the  best  examples  of 
firms  which  have  established  thorough  apprentice- 
ship systems. 

At  a  recent  date  The  Baldwin  Locomotive  Works 
indentured  three  different  classes  of  apprentices. 
Members  of  the  first  class  were  not  to  be  over 
seventeen  years  and  three  months  old  at  the  time  of 
entrance.  A  good  common-school  education  was 
required,  and  the  apprentices  were  obliged  to  attend 
night  school  two  evenings  per  week  for  the  first 
three  years  The  term  of  apprenticeship  in  this 
class  was  four  years.  The  wages  per  hour  for  the 
first,  second,  third  and  fourth  years  were,  respec- 
tively, five,  seven,  nine  and  eleven  cents.  At  the 
completion  of  the  four  years  a  bonus  of  $125  was 
given  each  apprentice.  Members  of  the  second 
class  must  not  be  over  eighteen  years  of  age  at  the 
time  of  entrance.  They  must  have  completed  an 
"advanced-grammar"  or  high-school  course,  and 
were  required  to  attend  night  classes  in  mechanical 
drawing  during  the  first  two  years.  Their  term  of 
service  was  three  years,  at  the  end  of  which  time  a 
bonus  of  $100  was  presented  to  each  young  man. 
The  third  class  was  designed  for  graduates  of 
201 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

colleges  or  technical  schools.  No  regular  night 
work  was  required,  but  the  members  of  this  class 
were  asked  to  read  technical  journals,  and  to  hand 
in  synopses  of  various  articles.  Members  of  the 
third  class  were  indentured  for  only  two  years. 

During  the  year  1904  many  agreements  as  to 
apprentices  were  ratified  between  The  International 
Machinists'  Association  on  one  hand,  and  railroad 
companies  on  the  other.  These  agreements  were  all 
similar.  The  number  of  apprentices  to  be  allowed 
in  any  railroad  shop  was  one  to  every  five  journey- 
men. The  length  of  indenture  was  four  years  of 
three  hundred  days  each.  The  company  agreed  to 
give  the  apprentice  adequate  instruction,  and  to 
change  him  at  regular  intervals  from  one  job 
to  another.  The  policy  employed  "is  aimed  to  protect 
the  railroad  against  a  scarcity  of  skilled  labor,  for 
which  it  has  a  continual  demand.  It  may  be  further 
serviceable  in  stimulating  the  loyalty  to  the  company 
and  protecting  the  esprit  de  corps  of  the  organiza- 
tion." An  agreement  between  the  Mason  Builders* 
Association  and  the  Bricklayers'  Union  of  Boston 
and  vicinity  provides  that  apprentices  must  be  able 
to  read  and  write  English,  and  emphasizes  the 
desirability  of  educating  the  apprentice,  particularly 
as  to  the  strength  and  quality  of  materials  and  the 
science  of  construction.  Both  parties  agreed  to  join 
in  an  eflfort  to  establish  a  school  for  members  of  the 
trade. 

From  a  consideration  of  these  examples  it  is 
evident  that  successful  apprenticeship  involves,  in 
the  eyes  of  both  employer  and  employee,  more  than 
202 


INDUSTRIAL    EDUCATION 

mere  shop  training.  The  best  apprentice  is  a 
student  as  well  as  a  worker.  In  recent  years  there 
has  also  been  a  rapid  increase  in  the  number  of  laws 
regulating  and  restricting  employment  in  certain 
trades,  and  requiring  that  these  trades  shall  not  be 
practised  except  by  well-qualified  persons.  The 
federal  government  and  at  least  three  fourths  of 
the  states  have  passed  statutory  provisions  requir- 
ing the  examination  and  licensing  of  persons  prac- 
tising trades  other  than  those  included  in  the 
so-called  higher  professions,  such  as  stationary, 
locomotive  and  steamboat  engineers,  plumbers  and 
gasfitters,  horseshoers,  barbers.  These  require- 
ments increase  the  demand  for  school  training. 
The  old  principle  of  granting  a  monopoly  to  those 
who  have  attained  a  certain  proficiency  seems  to  be 
returning  to  favor.  If  the  state  is  restricting  and 
raising  the  requirements  for  entrance  into  a  trade, 
it  should  stand  ready  to  oflfer  adequate  opportunities 
for  obtaining  the  requisite  knowledge  and  training 
required  by  law. 


203 


CHAPTER   XI 

TECHNICAL,    AGRICULTURAL    AND    COM- 
MERCIAL EDUCATION 

Technical  Education 
The  United  States  Military  Academy  at  West 
Point  is  the  "cradle"  of  American  engineers.  All 
technically  educated  civil  engineers  of  the  early  part 
of  last  century  came  from  West  Point.  As  early 
as  1802  two  civil  engineers  were  graduated  from 
that  institution.  All  the  early  engineers  were  "civil" 
or  "military"  engineers.  The  differentiation  of 
engineering  into  mechanical,  electrical,  mining  and 
chemical  is  a  later  development.  The  Renssalaer 
Polytechnic  Institute  of  Troy,  New  York,  founded 
in  1824,  was  the  first  technical  school  in  the  United 
States  for  the  sole  purpose  of  giving  instruction  in 
engineering.  Laboratory  work  in  that  institution 
wks  originally  included  under  the  head  of  amuse- 
ments. The  University  of  Michigan  was  the  first 
state  university  to  open  an  engineering  department. 
This  branch  of  the  work  was  made  equal  in  rank 
with  that  given  in  other  departments.  The  Colorado 
School  of  Mines  was  the  pioneer  in  mining 
engineering. 

204 


AGRICULTURAL    EDUCATION 

The  passage  o£  the  land  grant  act  of  1862  marks 
the  beginning  of  a  new  era  in  technical  and  agri- 
cultural education  in  the  United  States.  About 
sixty  state  colleges  of  agriculture  and  mechanics' 
arts  have  been  founded  under  the  provisions  of  this 
act.  The  last  fifteen  or  twenty  years  have  been 
marked  by  a  rapid  increase  in  the  number  of  engi- 
neering students  in  the  various  technical  schools  of 
this  country.  In  1889,  it  has  been  estimated,  there 
were  3,000  engineering  students  in  this  country;  in 
1899,  about  10,000;  while  in  1905  the  total  was  not 
less  than  20,000.  If  this  estimate  is  correct,  there 
was  a  sixfold  increase  in  less  than  a  score  of  years. 

The  most  interesting  and  significant  token  of 
progress  is,  however,  found  in  the  enrichment  of 
the  technical-school  curriculum.  Fifteen  years  ago 
the  course  of  study  for  engineering  students  was 
usually  limited  to  those  subjects  which  directly  per- 
tained to  the  work  of  an  engineer ;  and  the  concepts 
of  the  duties  and  field  of  an  engineer  were,  at  that 
time,  very  narrow.  To-day  the  engineer  is  becom- 
ing a  man  of  affairs  in  the  broad  sense  of  the  term ; 
he  is  now  one  of  the  leaders  and  directors  of  modern 
industry.  He  is  expected  to  be  more  than  a  mere 
technical  expert.  The  growth  in  the  complexity 
of  modern  life  has  been  reflected  in  the  training 
and  requirements  of  the  modern  technical  student. 
Many  teachers  of  engineering  are  now  advising  stu- 
dents to  take  a  complete  college  course,  or  at  least 
two  years  of  such  work,  before  taking  up  purely 
professional  studies.  The  necessity  of  a  broader 
curriculum  is  now  being  generally  recognized; 
205 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

coupled  with  this  is  an  attempt  to  make  the  work 
and  teaching  of  the  technical  school  square  with  the 
demands  of  practical  engineering  work.  This 
phenomenon  merely  affords  further  illustration  of 
the  effects  of  recent  progress  upon  education. 

Agricultural  Education 
The  Agricultural  College. — Agriculture,  as  well 
as  household  industry,  has  been  called  a  "belated" 
industry.  Many  partial  explanations  may  be  given 
to  account  for  this  fact.  Agriculture  as  a  science 
is  dependent  upon  many  other  more  fundamental 
sciences,  such  as  chemistry,  physics  and  botany;  it 
could  not  develop  or  reach  a  scientific  basis  until 
the  latter  were  also  placed  upon  a  firm  foundation. 
Agriculture  is  something  near  at  hand,  it  is  familiar 
to  all ;  scientific  investigation  invariably  begins  with 
the  far  off  and  the  unusual.  Again,  as  long  as 
large  quantities  of  free  and  fertile  land  were  to  be 
found  upon  our  western  frontier,  there  was  little 
demand  for  increased  fertility ;  the  economic  motive, 
which  prompts  investigation  and  improves  efficiency, 
was  not  strong.  As  a  consequence  the  entire 
development  of  agricultural  education  may  be  said 
to  have  occurred  during  the  last  fifty  years ;  and  the 
last  twenty  years  have  encompassed  the  major  por- 
tion of  that  development. 

The  first  American  agricultural  college  was  estab- 
lished, in  obedience  to  a  provision  in  the  state  con- 
stitution, in  1857  ^t  Lansing,  Michigan.  This 
pioneer  institution  opened  with  a  faculty  of  five, 
and  a   student  body  of   sixty-one.    In    1859   the 

20(j 


AGRICULTURAL    EDUCATION 

Farmer's  High  School  (now  the  State  College)  of 
Pennsylvania  was  opened  for  students.  Three 
years  later  followed  the  Morrill  Act,  which  led,  as 
has  been  noted,  to  the  establishment  of  a  long  list 
of  state  institutions  furnishing  instruction  in  scien- 
tific agriculture.  To  Michigan  and  Pennsylvania, 
however,  belongs  the  honor  of  being  leaders  in  this 
important  educational  movement. 

Agricultural  education  in  the  United  States  may 
for  convenience  be  roughly  divided  into  three 
divisions :  First,  the  courses  of  the  agricultural 
college.  This  agricultural  college  may  be  a  separate 
institution,  a  department  of  a  university,  or  it  may 
be  affiliated  with  a  mechanical  department  of  a 
technical  school.  Second,  agricultural  and  nature 
study  courses  in  the  secondary  and  primary  schools 
of  the  small  towns  and  of  the  rural  districts.  Third, 
agricultural  extension  work  of  various  kinds. 

The  college  is  the  oldest  of  the  three  forms.  In 
general  two  kinds  of  college  courses  are  given,  long 
and  short.  The  former  is  usually  four  years  in 
length  and  leads  to  the  degree  of  bachelor  of 
science  or  bachelor  of  agriculture.  The  require- 
ments for  admission  and  the  nature  of  the  work 
vary  considerably  in  different  institutions.  The 
short  courses  are  designed  for  students  who  can 
spend  but  little  time  in  residence  at  the  college. 
Such  courses  are  designed  to  give  a  maximum  of 
useful  knowledge  in  a  short  period  of  time. 

The  College  of  Agriculture  of  the  University  of 
Wisconsin  is  a  good  example  of  the  best  type  of 
agricultural  college  at  the  present  time.    The  aim 

207 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

of  this  department  as  stated  in  its  catalogue  is 
"First,  to  develop  agricultural  science  through  inves- 
tigation and  experiment,  and  to  disseminate  the 
same  through  bulletins  and  reports.  Second,  to 
give  instruction  in  agriculture  at  the  college. 
Third,  to  disseminate  agricultural  knowledge  among 
the  farmers  of  the  state  by  means  of  institutes  and 
popular  publications."  The  following  courses  are 
offered:  (i)  a  graduate  course  for  advanced 
students,  original  investigators  and  special,  well- 
trained  students;  (2)  a  long  course  which  offers 
"scientific  training  in  agricultural  chemistry,  agri- 
cultural physics,  horticulture,  animal  husbandry, 
dairying  and  agricultural  bacteriology" ;  (3)  a  short 
course,  which  is  of  a  practical  nature;  (4)  a  dairy 
course  for  young  men  who  intend  to  operate  cheese 
factories  and  creameries;  (5)  a  farmers'  course, 
which  is  designed  for  farmers, — men  who  are 
actually  engaged  in  the  industry, — this  course 
covering  a  period  of  only  two  weeks;  (6)  a  house- 
keepers' course,  or  conference  for  the  wives  and 
daughters  of  the  farmers  in  the  last-named  course. 

The  requirements  for  admission  to  the  long 
course  are  the  same  as  those  for  the  College  of 
Letters  and  Science  of  the  university.  In  the  short 
course  the  student  must  be  at  least  sixteen  years  of 
age  and  have  a  good  common-school  education. 
To  gain  admission  to  the  farmers'  course  the  candi- 
date must  be  at  least  twenty-five  years  of  age. 
According  to  the  catalogue  for  the  school  year  of 
1905-1906  the  number  of  students  in  the  college  of 
agriculture  was:  long  course,  136;  short  course, 
208 


AGRICULTURAL    EDUCATION 

322,  of  which  137  were  attending  for  the  second 
time;  dairy  course,  163.  In  the  winter  of  1905 
about  200  farmers  were  in  attendance  in  the 
farmers'  course.  The  criticism  that  the  agricultural 
college  educates  the  student  for  other  work  rather 
than  for  farming  seems  to  be  well  taken  when 
directed  against  the  four-year  college  course;  but 
the  short  course  does  not  lead  away  from  the  farm. 
The  most  recent  and  encouraging  feature  of  agri- 
cultural education  is  the  development  of  short 
courses.  The  four-year  course  prepares  the 
student  for  teaching,  experiment-station  work,  or 
other  scientific  work,  rather  than  for  actual  farming. 
This  instruction  is  valuable,  it  is  necessary ;  but 
it  produces  the  scientist  rather  than  the  farmer. 
Agriculture  is  in  reality  an  art  rather  than  a  science. 
The  farmer  should  be  considered  to  stand  in  the 
same  relation  to  the  scientist  as  does  the  skilled 
mechanic  to  the  engineer.  The  farmer  must  utilize 
the  methods  which  the  agricultural  scientist  origi- 
nates as  a  result  of  his  investigation,  laboratory 
experiments  and  analysis. 

In  the  University  of  Wisconsin  the  short  course 
covers  two  terms  of  fourteen  weeks  each.  The  first 
year's  work  includes  lectures  in  feeds  and  feeding, 
breeds  of  livestock,  agricultural  physics,  plant  life, 
dairying,  veterinary  science ;  laboratory  practice  in 
stock  judging,  agricultural  physics,  dairying;  a 
course  in  farm  bookkeeping;  and  recitation  and 
drill  in  parliamentary  practice.  During  the  second 
year  lectures  are  given  on  animal  nutrition,  breeds 
of  livestock,  agricultural  physics  and  meteorology, 
14  209 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

horticulture  and  agronomy,  elementary  agricultural 
chemistry,  veterinary  science,  agricultural  eco- 
nomics and  bacteriology;  laboratory  practice  is 
afforded  in  stock  judging,  physics  and  meteorology, 
horticulture  and  agronomy;  and  work  is  given  at 
the  forge  and  bench.  In  the  dairy  course  lectures 
and  class  work  are  given  on  milk,  creamery  accounts 
and  management,  cheese  making,  bacteria  in  the 
dairy,  heating  and  ventilating,  care  and  mangement 
of  the  boiler  and  engine,  feeding  and  management 
of  dairy  stock,  breeding  and  selection  of  dairy 
stock,  and  parliamentary  practice ;  laboratory  work 
is  assigned  in  milk  testing,  butter  making,  cheese 
making  and  dairy  machinery. 

The  farmers'  course  is  merely  an  improved  form 
of  a  farmers'  institute.  The  farmer  is  called  to  the 
university,  where  better  instruction  can  be  given 
him  than  at  any  other  place.  In  the  case  of  the 
institute  the  university  workers  go  to  the  farmer; 
in  this  case  the  reverse  happens.  Two  lectures 
daily  are  given,  and  the  remainder  of  the  day  is 
devoted  to  stock  and  corn  judging.  This  course 
was  first  mstituted  at  the  University  of  Wisconsin 
in  the  winter  of  1904.  The  housekeepers'  confer- 
ence was  first  held  in  the  winter  of  1905.  At  this 
conference,  which  lasted  for  ten  days,  lectures  or 
demonstration  lessons  were  given  on  the  food  prob- 
lem of  to-day,  beverages,  physical  development, 
house  sanitation,  need  of  public-school  instruction 
in  domestic  science,  care  of  children,  household 
bacteriology,  some  uses  of  cheese,  European  farm- 
houses, cereals,  breads,  cuts  of  beef,  fruits  and 
210 


AGRICULTURAL    EDUCATION 

vegetables,  winter  eggs,  food  for  the  sick,  household 
accounts,  propagation  and  care  of  house  plants,  the 
kitchen  garden,  food  adulteration,  water  supplies, 
dangers  in  water  and  milk,  raising  poultry,  cleanli- 
ness in  the  dairy.  The  two  ten-day  courses  are 
tentative  attempts  to  reach  and  help  the  adult  farmer 
and  his  wife.  If  successful,  these  courses  must  be 
primarily  useful  and  practical.  The  popular  and 
successful  lecturers  should  be  familiar  with  condi- 
tions on  the  farm.  They  must  be  in  sympathy  with 
the  farmer  and  his  wife,  and  must  take  a  keen 
interest  in  the  welfare  of  the  rural  family.  The 
success  of  a  teacher  is  in  a  large  measure  dependent 
upon  his  ability  to  adapt  his  methods  and  materials 
to  the  class  of  students  under  his  instruction. 

The  University  of  Wisconsin  devotes  six  build- 
ings to  agricultural  research.  The  farm  land  is 
divided  into  two  tracts  of  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
five  and  two  hundred  and  twenty  acres  respectively. 
Four  model  barns  have  been  built  not  far  from  the 
main  agricultural  building.  The  academy  and 
cheese  factory  is  placed  upon  a  commercial  basis. 
Farmers  bring  their  milk  to  the  dairy  building. 
Butter  and  cheese  are  made;  some  milk  is  pasteur- 
ized and  sold  to  consumers.  It  is  intended  to  be  a 
model  creamery  and  cheese  factory.  The  dairy 
department  of  the  Iowa  State  College  of  Agricul- 
ture and  Mechanic  Arts  is  also  in  operation  on  a 
commercial  basis  during  the  entire  year.  Dur- 
ing the  summer  season  from  15,000  to  25,000 
pounds  of  milk  are  daily  converted  into  butter  and 
cheese. 

211 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

Two  new  departments  of  the  University  of  Cali- 
fornia should  be  mentioned  at  this  point.  A  course 
has  been  arranged  with  a  view  to  studying  the 
agricultural  and  mechanical  problems  of  the  arid 
regions  of  the  West.  Some  of  the  problems  to  be 
studied  are  "the  construction  and  operation  of 
canals,  reservoirs  and  pumping  plants,  the  dis- 
tribution of  water,  the  social  and  legal  problems 
connected  with  the  ownership  and  administration 
of  irrigating  plants,  the  chemistry  of  the  soil,  the 
comparative  needs  of  agricultural  staples  for  water." 
The  increased  use  of  irrigation  opens  a  wide  field 
for  the  student  of  agricultural  and  mechanical  prob- 
lems. The  other  department  is  designed  to  train 
men  for  the  care  and  management  of  sugar-beet 
plantations  and  factories. 

Agriculture  in  the  Public  Schools. — Nature  study, 
agricultural  physics,  chemistry  and  economics,  if 
taught  in  the  public  primary  and  secondary  schools 
to  students  living  on  the  farm,  should  answer  the 
same  purpose  for  this  class  of  students  which 
apprenticeship  and  continuation  schools  do  for  the 
skilled  workers  in  shop  and  factory.  The  ideal 
place  for  a  school  is  in  a  rural  environment;  but 
even  under  desirable  natural  conditions  the  results 
in  the  rural  schools  have  not  been  encouraging  in 
the  past.  The  most  obvious  and  natural  material 
has  been  neglected.  Inefficient  and  poorly  paid 
teachers  and  ultra-conservative  school  directors, 
small  and  unsupervised  schools,  and  an  apathetic 
feeling  in  the  community  have  limited  the  teaching 
to  reading,  writing,  arithmetic,  history,  geography 

212 


AGRICULTURAL    EDUCATION 

and  perhaps  a  few  other  branches.  The  text-book 
is  too  often  bhndly  followed.  When  other  branches 
have  been  introduced  the  best  methods  have  not 
always  been  employed. 

In  past  generations  agriculturists  have  taken 
leading  parts  in  American  and  English  social  and 
political  life.  The  belief  is  firmly  planted  in  the 
American  heart  that  intimate  relations  with  the  soil 
are  necessary  for  good  citizenship  and  for  the  true 
development  of  the  physical  strength  and  the  moral 
virtues  of  the  individual  members  of  society.  The 
rural  school,  if  its  natural  advantages  are  properly 
utilized,  if  centralization  is  practised  so  as  to  enable 
competent  teachers  and  suitable  apparatus  to  be 
furnished,  has  a  fine  opportunity  for  combining 
manual  training,  outdoor  work,  nature  study, 
science  and  literature  in  a  way  which  will  enable 
the  teacher  to  discover  the  capabilities  and  special 
ability  of  each  student.  The  teacher  will  be  able 
to  instill  a  love  for  useful  work,  to  create  a  love  for 
nature,  and  to  train  the  powers  of  observation. 
These  qualities  are  the  best  sort  of  a  balance-wheel 
to  moderate  the  insane  desire  for  wealth,  power  and 
profits  which  is  a  characteristic  of  the  present  era; 
or  at  least  which  was  characteristic  of  the  one  which 
has  just  passed  into  history.  Such  a  training  will 
develop  clear-headed  and  wholesome-minded  men 
and  women  to  whom  the  insistent  advocates  of  the 
modern  creed  of  service  may  not  appeal  in  vain. 
Farm  life,  in  spite  of  its  disadvantages,  and  they  are 
many,  does  offer  one  great  advantage — variety  of 
occupation.  The  farmer  performs  different  tasks 
213 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

each  day,  and  the  nature  of  these  tasks  changes  with 
the  seasons.  A  knowledge  of  the  sciences  under- 
lying the  art  of  agricukure  will  remove  the  feeling 
of  drudgery  and  will  immeasurably  enhance  the 
enjoyment  and  benefit  to  be  derived  from  this 
occupation. 

A  county  superintendent  struck  the  key-note  in 
regard  to  the  future  of  rural  education  when  he 
asked:  "Along  with  his  [the  country  boy's]  study 
of  the  kangaroo,  the  bamboo,  and  the  cuckatoo, 
why  not  study  the  animals  on  the  farm  and  the 
proper  feeding  standard  for  them,  the  care  and 
composition  of  the  soil  of  the  farm,  the  improve- 
ment of  the  types  of  grains  and  vegetables,  and  the 
protection  of  birds  beneficial  to  the  farmer?  Instead 
of  all  of  the  boy's  arithmetic  being  devoted  to  prob- 
lems, more  or  less  theoretical,  on  banking,  stocks,-, 
exchange,  brokerage,  alligation,  and  partnership, 
why  not  some  practical  problems  with  reference  to 
farm  economics?"  This  is  sensible;  but  do  not 
forget  the  girl.  A  similar  change  of  base  should 
be  made  in  regard  to  her  studies.  In  the  choice  of 
educational  matter  and  methods  in  the  rural  school 
is  found  one  more  illustration  of  the  perversion  of 
the  familiar  pedagogical  maxim, — "from  the  con- 
crete to  the  abstract,  from  the  known  to  the 
unknown" — ^by  the  old,  threadbare  prejudice  against 
the  study  of  the  useful  and  the  familiar.  The  pres- 
ent insistently  demands  that  the  shackles  of  the  past 
be  broken,  and  that  our  teachers  face  the  future. 

The  story  of  the  soil  and  its  formation,  the  work 
of  the  earthworm,  how  nitrogen  is  abstracted  from 
214 


AGRICULTURAL    EDUCATION 

the  air,  are  all  marvelous,  interesting,  educative 
and  practical.  The  study  of  wheat,  oats,  clover, 
weeds,  the  apple  tree  are  as  interesting  and  as  dis- 
ciplinary, and  certainly  more  useful,  than  the  study 
of  rare  plants  and  hothouse  flowers,  or  of  the 
mythical  heroes  of  mythology  and  romanticism.  A 
study  of  the  common  birds  and  bees  will  arouse 
more  interest,  if  properly  presented,  than  a  study  of 
the  bird  of  paradise  or  of  the  zebra,  or  of  the  labors 
of  Hercules.  A  farm  is  truly  the  "greatest  of  all 
laboratories,"  and  yet  we  are  only  beginning  to 
realize  its  possibilities. 

Dr.  True  of  the  department  of  agriculture  divides 
secondary  agricultural  education  into  five  classes: 
"(i)  high  schools  connected  with  agricultural  col- 
leges, as  in  Minnesota  and  Nebraska;  (2)  separate 
agricultural  high  schools  endowed  by  the  State,  as 
*  in  Wisconsin,  Alabama,  and  California;  (3)  private 
agricultural  schools,  as  in  New  York,  New  Jersey, 
Pennsylvania,  and  Indiana ;  (4)  agricultural  courses 
in  normal  schools,  as  in  Missouri;  (5)  agricultural 
courses  in  public  high  schools."  The  first  agri- 
cultural high  school  was  organized  in  Minnesota. 
In  that  state  one  third  of  the  studies  given  are  of 
an  academic  nature;  one  third,  of  work  in  the 
sciences  upon  which  agriculture  rests,  personal 
investigation  by  the  student  rather  than  mere  book 
study  being  aimed  at;  and  one  third  relates  to  the 
practical  affairs  of  the  farm  and  household.  The 
Minnesota  high-school  course  covers  three  years  of 
approximately  six  months  each.  Six  months  are 
therefore    available    for   practical   work   upon   the 

215 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

farm.  It  is  in  reality  a  winter  continuation  school, 
made  practical  and  feasible  on  account  of  the  sea- 
sonal character  of  farm  work.  ^  The  different  sub- 
jects which  are  included  in  the  curriculum  are  as 
follows:  First  year,  music,  gymnastics,  English, 
drawing,  farm  arithmetic,  agricultural  botany,  com- 
parative physiology,  agronomy,  carpentry,  black- 
smithing  and  military  drill.  Second  year,  music, 
gymnastics,  algebra,  agricultural  chemistry,  agri- 
cultural physics,  agronomy,  animal  husbandry, 
dairying,  horticulture  and  military  drill.  Third 
year,  music,  gymnastics,  home  economy,  geometry  or 
civics,  entomology,  zoology,  agricultural  chemistry, 
agronomy,  poultry  culture,  animal  husbandry,  dress- 
ing and  curing  meats,  forestry,  and  veterinary 
science.  Instead  of  shopwork  and  a  portion  of  the 
work  in  agriculture,  the  girls  are  given  courses  in 
domestic  science.  The  school  "offers  a  practical 
course  of  study  designed  to  fit  young  men  and  young 
women  for  successful  farm  life,  and  it  serves  as  a 
preparatory  shool  for  the  college  of  agriculture." 
It  is  estimated  that  nearly  all  the  graduates 
remain  upon  the  farm. 

In  1 90 1  the  state  legislature  of  Wisconsin,  acting 
upon  the  advice  of  State  Superintendent  L.  D. 
Harvey,  passed  a  law  authorizing  county  boards  of 
education  to  establish  and  maintain  county  schools 
of  agriculture  and  domestic  science.  It  was  pro- 
vided that  "instruction  shall  be  given  in  the  elements 
of  agriculture,  including  instruction  concerning  the 
soil,  the  plant  life  and  the  animal  life  of  the  farm. 
A  system  of  farm  accounts  shall  be  taught.  Instruc- 
216 


AGRICULTURAL    EDUCATION 

tion  shall  also  be  given  in  manual  training  and 
domestic  economy  and  such  other  subjects  as  may 
be  prescribed."  Each  school  was  also  required  to 
have  connected  with  it  a  tract  of  land  of  at  least 
three  acres  in  area.  This  land  is  utilized  for 
experimentation  and  demonstration.  Provision 
ought  also  to  be  made  for  older  students  who  may 
wish  to  attend  for  short  periods  during  the  winter. 
Normal  training  should  be  carried  on  in  connection 
with  the  county  agricultural  high  schools  in  order 
that  suitable  teachers  may  be  provided  for  the 
county  schools, — ^teachers  who  are  in  sympathy  with 
the  movement  to  extend  nature  study  and  ele- 
mentary agricultural  training  into  the  elementary 
schools.  Normal  training  is  provided  for  in  the 
Dunn  County  schools,  located  at  Menomonie,  Wis- 
consin. The  lack  of  properly  trained  teachers  is 
now  one  of  the  most  serious  difficulties  standing 
in  the  way  of  the  introduction  of  nature  study  and 
the  elements  of  agriculture  into  the  primary  and 
secondary  schools  of  the  rural  districts.  Manual 
training  and  domestic  science  had  to  contend,  and 
in  fact  are  still  contending,  with  the  same  problem ; 
but  the  crust  of  tradition  and  prejudice  is  being 
broken  through,  and  the  farmers  and  the  manual 
workers  are  beginning  to  realize  that  education  can 
be  of  concrete,  practical  value  to  them  and  to  their 
children.  If  these  two  classes  strenuously  demand 
the  work  which  they  need,  teachers  and  schools  will 
be  forthcoming  to  supply  the  demand.  The  agri- 
cultural high  school  and  college,  farmers'  institutes, 
agricultural  experiment  stations,  and  the  United 
217 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

States  Department  of  Agriculture  are  the  chief 
agencies  which  are  now  educating  the  farmers  of 
this  country  as  to  the  importance  of  science  and 
nature  study  for  the  successful  farmer  of  to-day 
and  of  the  future. 

The  Farmers'  Institute. — Farmers'  institutes — 
adult  farmers'  schools — are  now  held  in  practically 
all  of  the  states.  Since  there  is  as  yet  no  central 
organization,  great  diversity  is  found  in  the  methods 
employed  and  in  the  form  of  organization.  The 
total  sum  appropriated  by  all  the  states  and  terri- 
tories for  this  purpose  was,  in  1903,  $187,226.  The 
maximum  appropriation,  $20,000,  was  allowed  by 
New  York.  In  1904  this  total  was  increased  to 
over  $210,000.  During  the  year  ending  June  30, 
1903,  3,179  institutes  were  held.  The  total  number 
of  daily  sessions  amounted  to  9,570,  with  a  total 
attendance  of  about  900,000.  These  institutes 
"have  been  an  outgrowth  or  extension  of  the  'open' 
or  'public'  meeting  held  by  the  state  or  local  agri- 
cultural societies." 

The  purpose  of  the  farmers'  institute  is  "to  carry 
valuable  agricultural  information  to  farming  people 
at  their  homes";  oral  instruction  by  expert  agri- 
cultural scientists  is  the  method  used.  In  recent 
years  some  attention  has  been  given  to  the  needs 
of  the  farmer's  wife.  One  or  more  lectures  on 
domestic  science  and  kindred  topics  of  interest  to 
the  wives  are  usually  included  in  the  program.  In 
Illinois  the  plan  of  devoting  a  half-day  session  to 
the  interests  of  the  boys  has  been  tried.  Sometimes 
premiums  are  offered  for  the  best  samples  of  com 
218 


AGRICULTURAL    EDUCATION 

grown  by  a  boy,  or  for  the  best  report  upon  the 
methods  of  growing  some  crop. 

The  "Hysperia  movement,"  which  originated  in 
Hysperia,  Michigan,  was  an  attempt  to  bring  the 
farmers  and  the  rural  teachers  together  for  mutual 
improvement,  social  enjoyment,  and  "to  unite  the 
farmers  who  pay  the  taxes  that  support  the  schools, 
the  home  makers,  the  teachers,  the  pupils,  into  a 
cooperative  work  for  better  rural  schools."  The 
meetings  were  held  on  Saturday  evenings  during 
the  winter  term,  in  the  different  school  buildings. 
"Programs  were  arranged  so  that  the  participants 
in  discussions  and  in  reading  of  papers  were  about 
equally  divided  between  teachers  and  patrons." 
This  plan  has  since  been  adopted  in  other  townships 
in  Michigan.  Such  a  scheme  fills  the  gap  between 
institutes,  offers  opportunities  for  social  gatherings 
in  rural  communities,  and  interests  the  farmers  in 
the  welfare  and  progress  of  rural  education.  To 
get  the  parents  to  come  to  the  school  building  and 
to  meet  and  discuss  school  affairs  with  the  teachers 
is  a  long  stride  in  advance  in  either  urban  or  rural 
districts. 

The  United  States  Department  of  Agriculture. — 
The  first  separate  appropriation  for  agricultural 
purposes  amounted  to  $35,000,  and  was  made  in  the 
year  1854.  The  department  was  separately  organ- 
ized in  1862,  but  did  not  become  an  executive 
department  until  1889.  Since  that  time  the  head 
of  the  department  has  been  a  member  of  the  Cabinet. 
The  duties  of  the  department  were  outlined  in  the 
act  of  1862  as  follows:  "To  acquire  and  diffuse 
219 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

among  the  people  of  the  United  States  useful  infor- 
mation on  subjects  connected  with  agriculture,  in 
the  most  general  sense  of  the  word,  and  to  procure 
and  propagate  among  the  people  new  and  valuable 
seeds  and  plants."  The  appropriations  for  the 
department,  including  the  weather  bureau,  for  the 
fiscal  years  ending  June  30,  1904,  1905,  1906, 
respectively,  were  $5,978,160,  $5,902,040,  and 
$6,882,690. 

The  work  of  the  department  is  organized  as  fol- 
lows. Bureaus :  weather,  animal  industry,  plant 
industry,  forestry,  chemistry,  soils,  entomology, 
statistics ;  divisions :  biological  survey,  accounts  and 
disbursements,  publication,  library ;  offices :  experi- 
ment station,  public  road  inquiries.  In  these  dif- 
ferent departments  an  immense  amount  of  work 
is  being  done  for  the  benefit  of  the  farmer  and  of 
the  consumer.  For  example,  the  department  is 
interested  in  contagious  diseases  of  animals,  meat 
inspection,  distribution  of  seeds  and  plants,  intro- 
duction of  new  plants  and  grains,  diseases  of  fruits 
and  crops,  forestry  extension  and  management, 
investigation  of  foods,  drugs,  etc.,  survey  of  the 
soil  in  the  United  States,  study  of  foreign  markets 
and  trade,  work  of  damaging  insects,  agricultural 
education,  problems  of  irrigation,  good  roads  and  a 
multitude  of  other  important  matters.  Millions  of 
copies  of  publications  are  issued  and  distributed 
annually.  In  affiliation  with  this  department  are 
agricultural  experiment  stations,  aided  by  national 
funds  and  located  in  every  state  and  territory. 
This  department  is  the  fountain  head  of  a  mag- 
220 


AGRICULTURAL    EDUCATION 

nificent,  unequalled  system  of  scientific  and  educa- 
tional work  in  agriculture.  It  is  blazing  the  way, 
and  a  statement  of  its  work  is  a  propos  to  the  topic 
of  agricultural  education. 

Schools  of  Forestry 

The  movement  to  preserve  the  forests  and  to 
initiate  economic  and  scientific  study  of  forestry 
has  borne  fruit  in  the  shape  of  the  Bureau  of 
Forestry  and  in  the  schools  of  forestry  which  are 
now  established  in  connection  with  several  univer- 
sities. The  first  school  of  this  nature  was  estab- 
lished in  1898.  At  present  Yale  University  gives  a 
two-year  graduate  course ;  the  number  enrolled  in 
1904-1905  was  about  sixty.  The  Biltmore  Forest 
School,  located  at  Biltmore,  North  Carolina,  has  an 
undergraduate  course  of  twelve  months'  duration. 
The  University  of  Michigan,  like  Yale,  has  estab- 
lished a  two-year  course  of  graduate  work  leading 
to  the  degree  of  master  of  science  in  forestry.  The 
Yale  School  grants  the  degree  of  master  of  forestry 
to  its  graduates.  Harvard  offers  a  four-year  under- 
graduate course  in  connection  with  the  Lawrence 
Scientific  School.  Undergraduate  courses  are  also 
given  in  the  University  of  Maine  and  the  Univer- 
sity of  Nebraska.  A  recent  magazine  article  states 
that  there  are  over  forty  institutions  of  learning 
in  this  country  which  offer  some  instruction  in  this 
new  economic  science. 

Forestry  is  really  a  form  of  agriculture;  but  the 
time  which  niust  elapse  between  planting  and  har- 
vesting is  very  long.  This  fact,  coupled  with  the 
221 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

important  and  obvious  social,  economic  and  climatic 
reasons  for  the  cultivation  of  forests,  has  made 
governmental  initiative  and  action  necessary.  For- 
esters will,  almost  without  exception,  be  government 
officials,  so  that  a  school  of  forestry  is  in  reality 
a  training  school  for  a  special  kind  of  expert  gov- 
ernment employees.  From  another  point  of  view, 
forestry  is  a  trade,  and  a  school  of  forestry  is  a 
form  of  trade  school. 

Commercial  Education 
Trade  and  technical  education,  and  instruction  in 
the  art  and  science  of  agriculture,  deal  directly  with 
the  production  of  economic  goods ;  commercial  edu- 
cation has  for  its  function  the  training  of  those  who 
distribute  goods,  those  who  transfer  the  goods  from 
the  producer  to  the  ultimate  consumer.  Keeping 
pace  with  the  development  of  modern  industry, 
commercial  operations  have  rapidly  increased  in 
intricacy  and  complexity  of  relations.  As  might  be 
expected,  the  history  of  commercial  education 
presents  many  phases  of  development  similar  to 
those  already  noted  in  trade,  technical  and  agri- 
cultural education.  The  early  commercial  school 
or  "college"  took  a  very  narrow  and  purely  practical 
view  of  its  mission ;  but,  as  time  goes  on,  a  broader 
and  broader  concept  of  the  field  and  value  of  the 
business  or  commercial  school  is  attained.  Starting 
from  individual  initiative  in  the  form  of  the  well- 
known  business  college,  this  work  is  being  gradually 
taken  up  by  the  public  schools  and  by  the  univer- 
sities of  the  United  States.     The  original  schools 

222 


AGRICULTURAL    EDUCATION 

and  nearly  all  of  their  successors  down  to  a  very 
recent  date  had  an  extremely  narrow  and  definite 
aim  These  institutions  grew  and  multiplied  in 
response  to  the  demands  of  business  men  for  better 
trained  clerical  workers.  By  1897  dissatisfaction 
with  this  rudimentary  curriculum  began  to  be  mani- 
fest. In  that  year,  in  an  address  before  the  Federa- 
tion of  Business  Teachers,  the  following  paragraph 
appears :  "The  training  which  the  American  com- 
mercial college  gives  its  pupils,  while  good  in  a  way, 
is  extremely  narrow  and  little  more  than  rudi- 
mentary. It  cannot  be  properly  called  business 
training;  it  is  merely  clerical  training.  While  this 
kind  of  training  may  have  satisfied  the  requirements 
in  the  past,  and  while  there  may  be  a  certain  demand 
for  it  in  the  future,  I  believe  the  time  has  arrived 
when  the  American  commercial  school  should  cease 
to  be  a  purely  clerk  factory  and  educational  repair 
shop,  and  should  assume  the  duties  and  position 
of  a  real  business  training  school.  In  order  to  do 
this  it  must  raise  the  standards,  broaden  and  deepen 
its  course  of  study  and  lengthen  its  time  require- 
ment." If  we  substitute  the  word  technical  for 
commercial  the  argument  would  sound  very  familiar 
to  those  interested  in  technical  education.  It  is  the 
old  cry  for  broader  educational  foundations ;  a  cry 
forced  from  us  by  the  pressure  of  economic  changes. 
One  of  the  leaders  in  modern  commercial  educa- 
tion advocates  three  kinds  of  business  training  to 
meet  the  requirements  of  as  many  classes  of 
students.  These  classes  are  "(i)  those  who  are 
compelled  to  take  positions  at  fourteen  years  or 
223 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

younger,  who  at  best  complete  the  course  of  the 
elementary  school  through  the  grammar  school ; 
(2)  those  who  can  give  three  or  four  additional 
years  to  training,  who  are  able  fairly  to  complete 
the  course  of  the  secondary  school;  (3)  those  who 
can  give  yet  other  years  to  higher  training."  This 
gentleman.  Professor  C.  A.  Herrick,  advocates  some 
form  of  day  or  evening  continuation  school,  the 
commercial  high  school  or  a  commercial  course  in  a 
high  school,  and  commercial  instruction  in  the 
college  or  the  university.  It  will  again  be  noticed 
that  these  demands  run  parallel  to  those  of  technical 
and  agricultural  education. 

Another  paragraph  in  the  same  article  is  signifi- 
cant, "Commercial  education  is  necessary  to  relieve 
business  of  the  monotony  of  its  routine,  to  raise  the 
business  man  above  the  machine.  If  one  is  to  rise 
above  the  mechanical  performance  of  his  duties  in 
business,  it  must  be  by  a  broader  study  and  a  more 
complete  understanding  of  the  processes  of  busi- 
ness. German  training  gives  to  the  man  who  goes 
into  trade  a  markedly  different  attitude  than  is  given 
to  him  by  Anglo-Saxon  education.  With  us  the 
business  man  finds  his  livelihood  in  business,  his 
life  is  elsewhere ;  the  German  finds  in  business  a 
means  of  life  as  well  as  livelihood ;  he  loves  busi- 
ness and  devotes  himself  unreservedly  to  it."  Con- 
sciously or  unconsciously  the  author  of  the  above 
paragraph  touches  one  of  the  fundamental  weak- 
nesses of  American  education  in  the  past.  It  has 
taught  that  business  or  the  pursuit  of  a  trade  was 
something  apart  and  distinct  from  real  living;  that 
224 


AGRICULTURAL    EDUCATION 

earning  a  living  was  a  necessary  evil,  not  an  essen- 
tial part  in  the  development  of  men.  It  has  created 
the  false  impression  that  life  was  lived  in  the  leisure, 
not  in  the  working,  hours.  This  is  a  logical  conse- 
quence of  a  restricted  view  of  the  province  of  edu- 
cation. As  a  result  of  a  broader  conception  of 
business  education,  the  curriculum  has  been  enriched 
by  such  studies  as  commercial  arithmetic,  com- 
mercial geography,  commercial  history  and  com- 
mercial law.  Business  education  is  becoming 
broader,  more  scientific  and  systematic. 


15  225 


CHAPTER   XII 

THE   CONTINUATION   SCHOOL 

In  igoo,  seven  out  of  every  eight  children  in  this 
country  which  glories  in  its  public-school  system, 
did  not  attend  school  after  their  fifteenth  birthday. 
Over  eighty-seven  per  cent,  of  our  future  men  and 
women  are  going  forth  into  their  life  work  without 
proper  preparation  and  without  adequate  oppor- 
tunity to  receive  the  benefits  of  education  after  they 
have  entered  the  treadmill  of  daily  life.  The 
greatest  national  industry  is  the  production  of 
efficient,  capable  and  well-trained  men  and  women; 
and  yet  our  educational  mechanism  only  gets  a  firm 
grasp  upon  about  one  in  every  eight  individuals 
who  pass  their  fifteenth  birthday.  The  typical 
American  child  of  to-day  has  only  received  the 
training  offered  by  the  first  six  or  seven  grades  of 
our  public  school.  The  business  enterprise  which 
was  no  more  efficient  in  its  methods  of  shaping  its 
product  than  is  the  American  nation  would  pass 
quickly  into  bankruptcy.  This  indictment  as  to  the 
true  efficiency  of  our  educational  system  is  severe, 
but  unfortunately  true. 

The  greatest  educational  and  industrial  need  of 
to-day  is  for  schools  which  will  assist  and  train  the 
young  workers  who  leave  school  for  various  reasons 
226 


THE    CONTINUATION     SCHOOL 

at  an  early  age.  The  public-school  curriculum  is 
adapted  to  the  needs  of  the  young  man  or  young 
woman  who  is  not  obliged  to  commence  earning  his 
or  her  living  at  an  early  age.  If,  however,  the  young 
student  is  obliged  to  leave  school  to  go  into  the 
shop,  the  store,  or  the  office  as  soon  as  our  com- 
pulsory education  laws  permit,  the  benefits  of  frfe 
instruction  are  placed  out  of  his  reach  except  in  a 
few  isolated  cases.  In  other  words,  the  instruction 
given  in  the  latter  portion  of  the  public-school 
course  is  accessible  only  to  him  who  has  sufficient 
funds  to  enable  him  to  remain  in  school  until  the 
end  of  his  eighteenth  year.  The  boy  or  girl  who 
works  must  rely  upon  other  facilities.  Here  is  the 
great  industrial  army  of  boys  and  girls  who  are 
unable  to  receive  anything  but  the  rudiments  of  an 
education. 

There  are  thousands  of  young  people  in  our  va- 
rious private,  night  and  correspondence  schools  who 
are  receiving  instruction  in  branches  which  are  or 
ought  to  be  found  in  the  curriculum  of  the  public 
school.  This  important  class  of  students  ought  to  be 
reached  through  the  agency  of  our  public  schools. 
These  young  men  and  young  women  realize  that  they 
need  the  assistance  of  education  in  their  daily  work, 
and  they  are  industrious ;  but  the  public  school  is  not 
within  their  reach.  It  is  in  session  at  precisely  the 
time  of  day  when  our  young  workers  must  be  earn- 
ing their  daily  bread.  Before  the  shop,  the  office, 
or  the  store  closes,  the  school  door  swings  shut, 
except,  of  course,  where  the  public  night  school  is 
established  in  a  permanent,  systematic  manner. 
227 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

By  means  of  compulsory  education  laws  many 
unwilling  children  are  forced  to  attend  school. 
They  are  led  triumphantly  to  drink  of  knowledge, 
while  this  great  army  of  workers  thirst  for  such 
instruction  as  will  make  them  better  artisans  and  bet- 
ter citizens.  Although  approximately  fifty  per  cent, 
of  our  skilled  workmen  are  foreign  born  and  foreign 
trained,  we  still  neglect  to  adequately  provide  for  the 
future.  Only  in  recent  years  has  this  important  phase 
of  education  attracted  attention.  The  private,  corre- 
spondence, and  Young  Men's  Christian  Association 
schools  which  have  sprung  up  all  over  this  broad 
land  of  ours  are  more  or  less  successfully  and  faith- 
fully offering  industrial,  trade,  scientific  and  com- 
mercial education  to  our  ambitious  workers.  The 
cost  of  tuition  in  many  of  these  schools  is  high,  and 
the  work  in  these,  as  well  as  in  the  majority  of  our 
public  night  schools,  is  usually  not  well  systematized 
or  organized.  The  training  given  in  many  of  our 
night  schools  is  fragmentary,  and  falls  far  short  of 
accomplishing  what  it  should.  Systematic,  well- 
organized  and  well-coordinated  courses  which  are 
designed  to  aid  actual  workers  are  needed.  How- 
ever well  the  private  night  school  or  the  corre- 
spondence school  may  have  answered  the  purpose  in 
isolated  cases,  they  are  not  the  proper  institutions 
to  permanently  provide  for  the  great  bodies  of 
workers  who  need  such  instruction.  It  is  the 
public,  not  the  private,  school  which  must  perform 
this  function.  We  should  copy  the  good  features 
of  the  European  continuation-school  system. 

?28 


THE    CONTINUATION    SCHOOL 

It  is  frequently  urged  that  these  young  workers, 
our  future  skilled  artisan^,  desire  trade  and  technical 
instruction.  Such  training  is  called  special  educa- 
tion,— a  training  for  the  few  at  the  expense  of  the 
many, — and  therefore  it  is  said  that  such  work 
should  not  be  given  a  place  in  the  public-school 
system  which  is  supported  by  public  taxation.  An 
unprejudiced  consideration  of  the  case  will,  how- 
ever, reveal  the  fact  that  much  of  our  present 
public-school  instruction  is  really  special ;  particu- 
larly is  this  true  of  that  given  in  our  high  schools. 
This  instruction  is  especially  valuable  to  one  who 
wishes  to  become  a  lawyer,  doctor,  minister  or 
teacher,  or  to  one  who  goes  from  the  high  school  to 
the  college.  Even  if  this  were  not  true,  it  could 
hardly  be  maintained  that  all  taxpayers  are  not 
vitally  interested  in  the  industrial  progress  of  the 
country.  If  it  can  be  shown  that  the  public-school 
system  may  do  much  to  improve  the  knowledge, 
skill  and  efficiency  of  our  future  workers  all  the 
arguments  which  have  been  employed  in  regard  to 
the  support  of  schools  by  public  taxation  may  also 
be  used  in  this  contention.  Further,  it  must  not  be 
forgotten  that  the  function  of  early  public-school 
education  was  in  a  large  measure  utilitarian, — the 
training  of  ministers  and  teachers.  It  aimed,  when 
prolonged  beyond  the  three  R's,  to  educate  only 
those  who  did  not  work  with  their  hands, — to  train 
a  professional  class.  The  people  of  the  United 
States  are  committed  to  the  doctrine  of  free  public 
education;  but  it  should  be  carried  to  the  workers 
229 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

as  well  as  to  the  young  men  and  young  women  of 
leisure. 

The  schools  are  criticized  on  the  ground  that  the 
teaching  is  not  practical,  and  that  the  student  enter- 
ing a  shop  must  unlearn  much  that  has  been  taught 
him — a  statement  that  has  sufficient  truth  in  it  to 
make  it  dangerous.  One  of  the  chief  reasons  for 
such  conditions  is  found  in  the  wide  separation  in 
point  of  time  of  theory  and  practice.  An  abrupt 
and  complete  separation  of  school  and  business  is 
not  desirable,  but  at  present  it  can  scarcely  be 
avoided.  The  home,  the  shop  and  the  school  ought 
to  be  brought  more  closely  into  touch  with  each 
other.  If  apprentices,  other  young  men  and  young 
women  entering  upon  their  life  work,  were  given 
good  opportunities  to  carry  on  school  work  at  the 
same  time,  as  is  done  in  Germany  and  in  other 
countries,  we  certainly  should  be  much  nearer  a 
rational  solution  of  the  apprenticeship  and  other 
vexatious  industrial  questions.  Public  night  or 
half-day  schools  ought  to  be  established  in  every 
city  and  town;  industry,  economics  and  education 
should  with  one  accord  make  this  demand  upon  the 
taxpayers  of  the  United  States.  Some  valid  and 
serious  objections  are  urged  against  night-school 
work.  It  is  often  said  that  the  young  man  or 
young  woman  who  has  worked  hard  during  the  day 
is  not  in  proper  physical  or  mental  condition  to  carry 
the  burden  of  night-school  work.  The  author  has, 
however,  taught  many  night-school  classes  which 
seemed  to  utterly  refute  this  proposition.  The 
nature  and  duration  of  the  daily  work  of  the 
230 


THE    CONTINUATION    SCHOOL 

student,  of  course,  enters  largely  into  the  question. 
With  the  general  introduction  of  an  eight-  or  a  nine- 
hour  day  the  force  of  this  objection  is  diminished. 
The  success  of  many  night  and  correspondence 
schools  tends  to  prove  that  night-school  work  can 
be  made  efficient,  and  that  it  is  worthy  of  further 
development.  The  increase  in  the  custom  of  giv- 
ing a  half-holiday  each  week  offers  another  oppor- 
tunity for  school  work. 

The  possibility  of  utilizing  a  portion  of  Sunday 
for  the  purpose  of  instructing  those  who  are  busy 
on  other  days  of  the  week  is  perhaps  remote ;  but  a 
calm,  unprejudiced,  unbiased  consideration  of  the 
question  will  disclose  some  good  arguments  in  favor 
of  such  an  innovation.  In  fact,  many  ministers 
seem  to  have  tacitly  given  recognition  to  the  value 
and  desirability  of  secular  instruction  on  Sunday 
by  converting  the  evening  sermon  into  a  semi- 
popular  lecture  upon  social,  economic  or  political 
questions  of  the  day.  The  church  does  not  reach 
the  majority  of  wage-earners  to-day;  and  Sunday 
is  frequently  made  a  day  of  demoralization  by  all 
classes  of  people,  rather  than  a  day  of  improvement 
and  rest.  A  Sunday  school  for  workers  affords  a 
wholesome,  elevating,  profitable  and  desirable  way 
of  utilizing  a  few  hours  of  each  Sabbath  day.  It  is 
at  least  better  than  many  of  the  devices  now 
employed  to  pass  away  time  on  that  day.  Indus- 
trial and  economic  efficiency  is  at  the  root  of  all 
moral  improvement;  if  Sunday  instruction  will 
improve  the  former,  it  is  worthy  of  a  trial.  The 
teaching  of  that  which  will  improve  the  skill  and 
231 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

broaden  the  view  of  men  cannot  be  immoral  whether 
it  is  done  on  week  days  or  on  Sunday.  The  expe- 
rience of  Germany  is  not  to  be  spurned  with 
contempt;  it  is  worthy  of  thought; — of  calm  con- 
sideration. The  following  quotation  illustrates  the 
point  in  a  concrete  manner :  "The  sentiment  of  the 
library  commission  [Wisconsin]  favors  the  opening 
of  the  public  library  reading  rooms  on  Sunday,  at 
hours  that  do  not  conflict  with  church  services. 
This  is  wise  and  humane,  for  otherwise  those  who 
most  need  the  books,  working  people,  could  not  use 
them,  and  would  be  restricted  for  their  Sunday 
reading  to  the  Sunday  edition  of  the  daily  paper. 
Of  the  Wisconsin  libraries  which  have  recently 
reported  to  the  commission,  twenty-seven  have 
Sunday  service."^ 

As  was  mentioned  in  the  discussion  on  the  cor- 
respondence school,  the  idea  of  utilizing,  through 
school  work  of  some  sort,  the  idle  periods  in  a 
seasonal  industry,  or  of  providing  training  and 
education  for  men  who  are  out  of  employment,  is 
very  attractive.  If  local  conditions  are  favorable, 
continuation  schools  open  a  portion  of  the  day  as 
well  as  in  the  evening  might,  with  profit,  take  up 
such  work.  In  time  employers  would  naturally  turn 
to  such  schools  for  workmen;  and  immediate,  con- 
crete, economic  motives  would  lead  idle  men  to 
enroll  in  such  a  school. 

The  continuation  school  is  particularly  valuable 
for  the  apprentice.  The  general  establishment  of 
such   a   school  would   go   far   toward  solving  the 

^  South  Atlantic  Quarterly,  January,  1904. 
232 


THE    CONTINUATION    SCHOOL 

apprenticeship  question  in  this  country.  One  of 
the  officials  of  the  Baldwin  Locomotive  Works 
writes :  "We  depend  upon  the  various  night  schools 
established  throughout  the  city  [for  technical 
instruction],  and  we  pray  for  the  establishment  of 
more  and  better  night  schools,  to  give  instruction 
for  that  portion  of  the  training  of  the  apprentices." 

These  schools  are  favored  by  employers  because 
the  best  student  is  one  who  is  working  as  well  as 
studying.  There  are  many  who  are  willing  to 
subscribe  to  the  statement  of  Thomas  Davidson : 
"No  one  who  has  ever  taught  a  class  of  intelligent 
breadwinners  will  return  willingly  to  academic 
teaching."  A  boy  who  is  not  diligent  is  frequently 
changed  into  a  good  student  by  taking  him  from 
school  for  a  short  period  of  time  and  obliging  him 
to  earn  his  daily  bread.  He  gets  an  insight  into  the 
affairs  of  the  business  world  which  teaches  him  that 
the  school  is  an  institution  which  can  aid  and 
benefit  him. 

The  public-school  system  as  it  is  organized  cannot 
reach  the  class  of  people  who  are  in  the  greatest 
need  of  it.  The  continuation  night  school  is  to  be 
the  worker's  high  school  and  must  be  adapted  to  the 
needs  of  the  working  classes.  A  continuation  school 
is  not,  or  should  not  be,  a  trade  school.  Trades  can 
be  best  taught  in  close  connection  with  practical 
work.  It  is  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  duplicate 
in  the  school  the  commercial  and  competitive  con- 
ditions which  obtain  in  the  shops.  As  has  been 
mentioned,  the  trade  school  is  opposed  by  labor 
unionists  because  it  sends  from  its  doors  semi- 
233 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

skilled  workers  who  tend  to  depress  the  general 
level  of  skill  and  to  lower  the  wages  in  particular 
trades.  The  trade  school  is  also  liable  to  unduly 
increase  the  number  of  workers  in  certain  trades. 
The  continuation  school,  however,  avoids  these 
reasonable  objections.  It  deals  as  a  rule  with  per- 
sons who  are  already  at  work;  it  supplements  the 
narrow  training  which  they  are  daily  receiving  from 
their  work.  Education,  not  mere  book  learning, 
is  the  cure  for  many  industrial  evils;  but  the  false 
conception  that  the  sphere  of  education  is  entirely 
distinct  from  the  business  and  industrial  world  must 
be  cast  overboard.  Much  of  the  present  labor 
trouble  is  due  to  adherence  to  outgrown  educational 
ideals,  the  lack  of  proper  educational  facilities,  and 
the  absence  of  broad  views  and  calm  reasoning  which 
are  the  logical  results  of  correct  educational  methods. 
The  recent  decrease  in  the  number  of  hours 
worked  per  day  by  the  average  wage-earner  will 
enable  much  to  be  done  toward  giving  young 
workmen  better  educational  facilities,  and  makes 
the  present  particularly  opportune  for  the  advo- 
cacy of  the  continuation  school.  Increased  leisure 
should  bring  more  culture  and  more  rational  means 
of  enjoyment.  Long  hours  are  a  sure  preventive 
of  the  educational  and  the  economic  advancement  of 
workers  as  a  class.  The  question  of  the  education 
of  workers  in  trade  and  industry  is  of  national 
importance  from  at  least  two  points  of  view.  Our 
industrial  and  commercial  supremacy  depends  upon 
the  existence  of  a  skilled  body  of  wage-earners,  for 
which  there  is  to-day  an  increasing  demand ;  and  the 
234 


THE    CONTINUATION    SCHOOL 

success  of  a  democratic  form  of  government  rests 
upon  the  intelligence,  integrity  and  economic  inde- 
pendence of  the  great  mass  of  its  citizens. 

Local  needs  and  local  influences  must  always  be 
considered  in  the  adoption  of  a  course  of  study  for 
the  continuation  schools;  but  in  a  general  way  an 
outline  can  be  drawn  up.  The  housekeeping  schools 
of  Belgium  and  the  English  schools  for  girls  offer 
excellent  models  for  the  work  to  be  given  girls. 
The  program  should  include  hygiene ;  care  of  chil- 
dren, sick  and  old  persons;  knowledge  of  simple 
remedies ;  principles  of  domestic  economy ;  nutritive 
value  of  different  foods ;  cooking  of  simple  meals ; 
methods  of  making  use  of  foods  "left  over"; 
domestic  accounts ;  market  value  of  foods ;  practice 
in  distinguishing  freshness  and  quahty  of  supplies; 
care  of  house  and  furniture ;  house  sanitation ; 
washing  and  ironing  of  woolen,  cotton,  flannel  and 
linen  goods;  plain  sewing,  mending,  darning,  piec- 
ing, and  the  determination  of  the  cost  of  apparel 
made;  care  of  yard  or  court;  care  of  flowers  and 
shrubs.  This  outline  roughly  indicates  the  character 
of  the  course  in  housekeeping  which  is  needed  in  all 
of  our  cities,  villages  and  rural  districts.  Not  alone 
in  continuation  schools  is  such  a  program  desirable, 
but  in  the  regular  work  of  our  public  schools  as 
well.  The  general  adoption  of  such  a  program 
would  mean  great  improvement  in  home  conditions 
throughout  the  United  States.  In  addition  to  the 
above  program  girls  should  be  admitted  to  courses 
in  art,  business  training,  mathematics,  literature, 
and  in  other  academic  studies.  All  work  should  be 
235 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

of  a  practical  nature  and  should  aim  to  make  the 
girl  a  better  housekeeper,  stenographer  or  factory 
employee.  Cultural  aims  must  not  be  overlooked, 
but,  if  the  work  is  to  be  successful,  these  must  be 
subordinated.  Furthermore,  the  character  and 
nationality  of  the  students,  their  home  and  store  or 
shop  environment,  and  the  ideals  of  the  community 
in  which  they  live,  should  be  given  due  weight  in 
the  determination  of  the  methods  to  be  used  in  pre- 
senting the  various  subjects. 

The  boys  will  require  a  greater  amount  of  option. 
The  boy  who  is  employed  in  a  machine  shop  may  be 
used  as  an  example.  He  needs  training  in  arith- 
metic, plain  geometry,  applied  mechanics,  and  per- 
haps in  algebra ;  mechanical  and  freehand  drawing ; 
elementary  physics  and  chemistry,  and  English, 
supplemented  by  lectures  on  travel,  scientific  topics, 
development  of  machinery,  applied  electricity,  his- 
tory, civics,  art  and  hygiene.  By  judicious  treat- 
ment arithmetic,  geometry,  algebra  and  applied 
mechanics  can  be  taught  together  as  one  subject; 
in  fact,  this  is  the  proper  method  to  be  employed. 
The  practical  side  must  be  ever  kept  uppermost  in 
these  schools ;  otherwise  the  interest  flags  and  the 
attendance  decreases.  Problems  must  be  given 
which  might  actually  come  into  the  everyday  expe- 
rience of  the  student  worker.  As  far  as  possible 
students  from  the  same  trades  should  be  placed  in 
the  same  class,  in  order  that  practical  application 
of  the  fundamental  mathematical  and  scientific 
principles  may  be  made  to  a  particular  trade. 

No  man  can  become  a  skilled  worker  to-day  who 
236 


THE    CONTINUATION    SCHOOL 

does  not  understand  the  scientific  principles  under- 
lying his  trade,  who  does  not  understand  why  cer- 
tain methods  are  preferable  to  others,  who  is  not 
able  to  act  upon  his  own  initiative  in  cases  of 
emergency.  Much  must  be  learned  outside  the 
shop.  In  other  words,  a  trade  cannot  be  properly 
learned  without  a  school.  The  industrial  value  of 
school  training  varies  with  the  different  occupations. 
In  the  machine-building  trades  it  is  almost  indis- 
pensable ;  in  some  unskilled  classes  of  work  it  is  of 
much  less  direct  value.  But,  if  a  man  is  more  than 
the  machine  he  tends,  he  needs  a  training  which  will 
allow  him  to  look  beyond  the  narrow,  almost  auto- 
matic routine  of  his  daily  life.  Industrial  and 
scientific  training  will  make  him  a  better  citizen, 
worker  and  parent.  That  education  is  best  which 
lies  close  to  the  life  and  experience  of  the  student. 
It  should  gradually  unfold  new  ideas,  present  new 
phases  of  life  and  lead  to  a  higher  plane  of  life. 
The  continuation  schools  should,  as  has  been  inti- 
mated, eventually  become  an  integral  part  of  the 
public-school  system ;  but  at  first,  as  has  been  the 
case  with  many  other  reforms,  private  philanthropic 
individuals  must  probably  take  the  initiative.  If  a 
number  of  such  schools  could  be  established  in  some 
large  city  a  concrete  example  would  be  offered  to 
the  thinking  people  of  the  United  States,  and  the 
value  of  this  work  could  be  practically  demon- 
strated. In  one  well-known  city  a  fund  of  three 
million  dollars  was  left  a  few  years  ago  in  the  hands 
of  trustees  for  the  purpose  of  establishing  a  school 
or  schools  for  industrial  training  in  that  city.  If 
237 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

such  a  fund  could  be  utilized  so  as  to  build  up 
several,  for  example  three,  schools  in  different  sec- 
tions of  a  city  where  the  industrial  population  make 
their  homes,  this  would  afford  a  fine  opportunity  to 
work  out  the  details  of  the  curriculum.  This  sum 
is  sufficient  to  build  and  equip  three  buildings  and 
still  leave  a  sufficient  sinking  fund  to  pay  current 
expenses.  Each  building  should  become  a  com- 
munity center.  Here  clubs  and  societies  could  meet. 
The  buildings  ought  also  to  be  equipped  with  read- 
ing rooms,  a  gymnasium  and  a  swimming  pool. 

Until  some  such  measures  as  are  here  proposed 
are  put  into  actual  operation,  all  attempts  to  improve 
the  industrial  and  home  conditions  of  our  working 
classes  are  made  under  disadvantageous  conditions. 
Let  us  go  to  the  bottom  and  begin  by  attempting  to 
purify  the  source.  Economic  conditions  are  the 
cause  of  much  degradation ;  a  large  percentage  of 
vice  and  crime  is  the  product  of  low  standards  of 
living  and  unhealthy  conditions. 

The  fact  that  the  continuation  school  for  actual 
workers  offers  a  promising  field  for  philanthropists 
should  be  emphasized.  It  is  more  necessary  than 
additional  libraries,  laboratories,  or  universities ; 
and  more  practical  and  far-reaching  than  social 
settlements,  associated  charities,  or  factory  "wel- 
fare" work;  both  employers  and  employees  should 
unite  in  demanding  the  establishment  of  these 
schools.  To  take  an  active  part  in  the  movement 
for  properly  training  the  heterogeneous  mass  of 
young  people  who  are  growing  into  manhood  and 
womanhood  is  worthy  of  our  most  earnest  endeavors. 
238 


CHAPTER   XIII 

THE  TREATMENT   OF  THE  TRUANT   AND   THE 
JUVENILE  DELINQUENT 

The  urban  population  of  the  United  States  is 
rapidly  increasing.  Year  after  year  it  becomes 
more  and  more  necessary  for  us,  as  a  people,  to 
learn  to  live  and  thrive  in  the  crowded  city.  The 
rural  districts  cannot  much  longer  serve  as  the 
feeder  for  the  city.  If  in  the  future  there  cannot 
be  produced  in  the  American  city  men  and  women 
who  are  strong  and  efficient  intellectually,  physically 
and  morally,  American  civilization  is  imperiled. 
Yet  in  the  crowded  schools  of  our  large  cities  the 
problem  of  the  truant  and  delinquent  or  so-called 
"incorrigible"  child  has  assumed  serious  propor- 
tions. The  solution  is  difficult ;  but  the  demand  for 
it  is  imperative.  The  modern  city  with  its  crowded 
quarters  seems  to  increase  the  number  of  children 
of  this  class ;  our  cities  are  indeed  the  breeding 
places  of  criminals  and  paupers.  In  the  thickly 
settled  districts  of  all  our  important  cities  children 
are  growing  to  manhood  and  womanhood  who  are 
improperly  nourished,  whose  home  surroundings  are 
bad,  who  are  given  little  or  no  opportunity  to  learn 
habits  of  industry  or  regularity, — in  short,  who  are 
almost  of  necessity  destined  to  a  life  of  inefficiency, 
239 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

ill-health  and  moral  peril.  Statistics  indicate  that 
the  number  of  juvenile  criminals  is  largest,  rela- 
tively to  the  total  population,  where  the  greatest 
urban  and  manufacturing  centers  are  located.  The 
same  is  true  of  almshouse  paupers. 

In  order  to  become  better  acquainted  with  the 
characteristics  of  the  juvenile  delinquent  let  us 
study  a  composite  picture  which  has  been  painted  by 
one  who  understands  him.  "He  is  twelve  and  one- 
half  years  of  age,  one  of  seven  people  living  in  three 
rooms.  These  rooms  are  such  as  can  be  rented  for 
$7.50  per  month.  Eight  dollars  and  sixty  cents  per 
week  pays  the  rent,  buys  fuel,  clothing,  pays  the  fee 
required  in  the  parochial  school,  in  short,  provides 
all  the  required  needs  of  this  family.  There  is  no 
place  for  health  recreation.  The  house  is  crowded, 
dreary,  uninviting."  Jacob  Riis  believes  that  "it  is 
the  home  itsdf  which  constitutes  their  [the  children 
of  the  poor]  chief  hardship."  Some  years  ago  an 
Englishman  personally  investigated  the  history  of 
one  thousand  criminals.  He  found  that  two  hun- 
dred and  fifty,  or  one  fourth  of  the  total,  were 
brought  to  that  condition  through  the  influence  of 
bad  company.  A  prison  warden  recently  made  this 
observation:  "The  higher  the  character  of  the 
daily  pursuits,  the  greater  the  unlikelihood  of  falling 
into  crime;  the  more  secure  the  employment,  the 
higher  the  earnings,  the  lower  the  percentage  of 
criminals."  Bad  home  environment,  unfortunate 
street  influences,  and  lack  of  regular  and  healthful 
occupation  are  three  extremely  potent  causes  of 
criminality  and  pauperism.  The  picture  of  the 
?40 


THE    JUVENILE    DELINQUENT 

juvenile  delinquent  is  indeed  a  sad  one;  but  it  is  a 
typical  representation  of  the  environment  in  which 
thousands  of  precious  young  lives  are  growing  to 
manhood  and  womanhood. 

Forty  or  fifty  children  from  a  great  variety  of 
homes  now  come  to  each  of  our  primary  class- 
rooms,— children  whose  home  life  and  playground 
experiences  are  radically  dissimilar.  One  child  per- 
haps lives  in  a  two-  or  three-room  shack,  and  plays 
in  the  street  or  the  alley ;  another  dwells  in  a  man- 
sion, and  plays  in  a  well-shaded  yard.  The  parents 
of  one  child  understand  and  appreciate  child 
nature;  he  is  properly  nourished  and  clothed,  and 
the  character  ot  the  home  life  and  surroundings  is 
excellent.  The  child  occupymg  the  next  desk  may 
be  kicked  and  cuflfed  at  home ;  he  is  poorly  fed  and 
clothed.  These  two  children,  for  example,  of 
radically  dissimilar  experiences  and  opportunities, 
come  to  the  classroom  and  are  mingled  with  two 
score  other  restless  youngsters  of  like  age.  Hered- 
ity and  environment  have  done  their  work;  no  two 
of  these  children  are  equal  in  physical  endurance, 
mental  ability  or  moral  stamina.  Yet,  almost  of 
necessity,  our  public-school  system  is  attempting  to 
force  these  children  into  lockstep.  Financial  con- 
ditions, educational  traditions  and  unsympathetic 
public  opinion  are  guilty  of  causing  enormous 
pedagogical  waste.  It  should  be  axiomatic  that 
children  from  a  great  variety  of  homes,  subject  to 
very  different  home  influences,  cannot  be  effectively 
and  efficiently  dealt  with  en  masse.  Boys  whose 
only  playground  is  the  street  are  in  a  very  different 
i6  241 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

receptive  mood  from  those  who  are  favored  with 
large  and  commodious  playgrounds;  the  boy  whose 
home  atmosphere  is  elevating  should  be  treated 
differently  from  the  youth  whose  home  exerts  a 
depressing  influence. 

A  child  is  a  bundle  of  energy  which  seeks  legiti- 
mate outlet  In  order  that  the  child  may  develop 
normally  such  outlets  must  be  provided.  The 
home,  the  school  and  the  playground  must  furnish 
the  boy  or  girl  with  opportunities  to  exercise,  to 
express  himself  or  herself,  to  develop  and  grow 
into  good  and  useful  manhood  or  womanhood.  In 
too  many  instances  each  institution  pursues  a 
repressive  policy  which  is  often  detrimental  to  the 
child.  In  many  cases,  no  doubt,  this  is  due  to  cir- 
cumstances which  do  not  readily  admit  of  change. 
The  child  lives  in  a  small  home.  As  a  consequence, 
his  noise  is  almost  of  necessity  repressed  and  he 
is  sternly  rebuked  because  of  it.  His  street  games 
are  interfered  with  and  interrupted  by  the  passer- 
by, older  boys  or  the  policeman.  He  goes  to  the 
schoolroom,  and  is  told  to  sit  still  for,  to  him,  a  long 
period.  His  teacher  gives  him  a  book  and  expects 
him  to  study  it;  the  book  presents  ideas  which  are 
often  completely  foreign  to  his  experience.  He  has 
nothing  in  common  with  this  printed  page,  no  clue 
whereby  to  connect  it  with  his  experience  outside 
the  schoolroom.  Is  it  strange  that  truant  and  "in- 
corrigible" boys  are  found  in  our  city  schools? 
Must  it  not  be  expected  that  the  boy  and  his  teacher 
will  sometimes  clash  in  regard  to  their  ideas  of 

2^ 


THE    JUVENILE    DELINQUENT 

right  and  wrong?    Is  it  extraordinary  that  the  boy 
often  looks  upon  older  persons  with  suspicion? 

No  boy  or  girl  is  wholly  bad  or  depraved. 
"There  is  no  such  thing  as  a  bad  boy."  Buried 
somewhere  beneath  the  rough  and  often  coarse 
exterior  can  be  found  a  heart.  The  heart  should 
be  cultivated  rather  than  trampled  upon,  as  it  so 
often  is.  Much  could  be  done  toward  the  uplifting 
of  mankind  if  we  would  only  search  for  the  heart 
in  a  boy  and  then  try  to  lead  it  in  the  right  direction. 
"Get  at  the  heart  of  the  boy  and  you  have  won  the 
head  of  him  and  his  fellows.  You  have  won  the 
coming  generation  over  to  a  higher  line  of  con- 
duct." Rowdyism  and  crime  are  to  a  large  extent 
due  to  pent-up  energy  which  has  not  found  proper 
vent;  vice  is  misdirected  energy.  A  restless,  eager, 
alert,  active  child  needs  continual  opportunity  to 
play,  to  work,  to  construct  and  to  tear  down.  As 
Dr.  C.  R.  Henderson  has  written :  "The  boy  must 
be  kept  busy  till  he  is  sleepy,  and  he  must  wake  up 
and  get  up  at  a  regular  minute  or  he  is  in  danger." 
Education,  from  the  psychological  point  of  view, 
consists  in  giving  proper  direction  to  the  normal 
activities  of  the  child,  and  in  the  formation  of 
regular  and  good  habits  of  action  and  expression. 
The  rush  of  population  into  the  urban  centers  and 
the  loss  of  the  home  industries  has  deprived  the 
city  boy  of  his  home  chores  and  of  his  playground, 
and  we  are  just  awakening  to  the  fact  that  a  sub- 
stitute must  be  furnished  or  the  city  boy  will  not 
attain  a  normal  and  healthful  development. 
243 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

In  school  he  is  repressed  and  kept  quiet ;  when  he 
comes  out  of  the  schoolroom  he  is  ushered  into  a 
world  in  which  no  special  provision  is  made  for 
him.  Our  homes,  with  perhaps  a  few  exceptions, 
provide  no  special  place  for  the  child;  the  architect 
seems  to  be  utterly  oblivious  of  his  presence.  If 
he  is  continually  restrained  by  the  policeman  on  the 
street,  the  parents  in  the  home,  and  the  teacher  in 
the  school,  the  natural  and  inevitable  result,  if  the 
child  is  normal,  healthy  and  vigorous,  is  attempted 
evasion  of  rules  and  regulations.  Particularly  in 
the  crowded  and  poorer  districts  of  the  great  cities 
is  the  child  an  outcast.  He  is  obliged  to  shift  for 
himself,  and  the  street,  of  necessity,  becomes  his 
playground  and  loafing  place.  Such  a  life  inevi- 
tably breeds  irregularity  and  distaste  for  any  regu- 
lar occupation;  it  allows  the  child  to  grow  up  in 
idleness,  and  throws  him  into  contact  with  bad  and 
immoral  influences.  It  is  not  strange  that  there 
are  so  many  truants,  "unruly  boys,"  and  juvenile 
delinquents;  rather  is  it  a  matter  of  astonishment 
that  there  are  so  few. 

A  child  does  not  get  into  mischief  just  for  the 
sake  of  mischief,  but  because  he  must  do  something, 
because  he  must  find  an  outlet  for  his  surplus 
energy.  There  is  always  some  particular  liking  or 
desire  which,  if  discovered,  offers  an  entrance  to 
the  heart  of  a  child.  In  order  that  the  school  may 
be  directive,  not  repressive,  it  is  necessary  that  the 
teacher  study  the  motives  and  impulses  of  the  young 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  latter.  Their  motives, 
ideals  and  ambitions  cannot  be  appreciated  from 
244  . 


THE    JUVENILE    DELINQUENT 

the  adult  point  of  view;  if  the  teacher  is  unable  or 
unwilling  to  take  the  point  of  view  of  the  child,  the 
opportunity  of  helping  the  youthful  student  at 
critical  periods  in  his  life  is  lost.  A  prominent 
educator  has  said :  "The  child  loves  to  be  obedient ; 
he  loves  law,  not  restrictive,  but  directive."  The 
author  believes  that  teachers  of  manual  training, 
nature  study,  drawing,  or  kindergarten  work  will 
agree  with  this  statement.  We  give  the  child  prob- 
lems which  are  to  him  new  and  foreign;  we  make 
him  a  mere  solver  of  artificial  problems.  He  has 
his  own  personal  experiences,  he  has  his  own  prob- 
lems which  he  is  very  anxious  to  solve;  but  these 
are  resolutely  cast  aside  and  not  utilized  by  the 
teacher. 

If  children  are  found  in  our  crowded  school- 
rooms who  chafe  under  and  are  not  readily  amenable 
to  the  discipline  there  in  force,  it  should  be  clear 
that  the  correct  kind  of  training  is  not  or  cannot  be 
given  them.  No  teacher,  no  matter  how  con- 
scientious or  efficient  she  may  be,  can  properly  treat 
particular  cases  in  a  school  of  forty  or  fifty  bright, 
energetic  and  restless  children.  Many  cases  require 
special  treatment;  and  viewed  from  a  purely 
financial  point  of  view — let  the  taxpayer  take  notice 
— it  is  more  desirable  to  treat  the  case  now  than 
later  in  the  career  of  the  particular  individual. 
Many  children  in  the  crowded  schoolrooms  of  our 
densely  populated  cities  will,  if  left  to  their  own 
devices,  become  unworthy  specimens  of  humanity, 
or  perhaps  criminals.  Yet  these  children  are  not 
bad;  they  are  "morally  sick."  Improper  training 
245 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

and  environment  in  both  home  and  school  have,  in 
a  large  measure,  made  them  what  they  are  to-day. 
Work  and  treatment  should  be  given  which  will 
turn  them  toward  better  ideals  and  good  citizen- 
ship, and  which  will  aid  in  the  formation  of  regular 
and  good  habits,  for  good  habits  are  the  basis  of 
crime  prevention.  For  example,  a  boy  whose  only 
playground  is  the  street,  and  who  is  continually 
thrown  into  contact  with  an  undesirable  class  of 
companions,  soon  gets  the  notion  that  it  is  manly 
to  smoke  cigarettes.  Now  no  amount  of  lessons 
on  physiology  or  talks  on  the  evils  of  smoking  will 
have  any  lasting  effect  upon  that  boy.  If  he  is  to 
give  up  what  now  seems  to  him  to  be  an  essential 
of  manhood,  a  very  strong  concrete  motive  for  such 
an  action  must  be  given  him.  A  new  inspiring 
ideal  must  be  held  up  before  him ;  and  this  must  be 
one  which  appeals  to  the  youth,  not  merely  to  the 
adult.  Athletics  is  one  particularly  beneficial  arent 
which  should  be  employed  in  the  treatment  of  such 
cases.  No  successful  athlete  can  be  an  habitual 
smoker  of  cigarettes ;  in  general,  his  habits  must  be 
good.  Here  is  disclosed  one  of  the  great  benefits 
of  well-directed  athletic  sports.  The  desire  to 
excel  in  athletics,  and  the  emulation  of  such  excel- 
lence is  a  deep  and  abiding  trait  in  the  young.  As 
Emerson  has  well  said,  "Man  can  only  be  reformed 
by  showing  him  a  new  idea  which  commands  his 
own."  But  we  should  do  better  than  this;  we 
should  aim  to  so  form  the  habits  and  character 
as  to  make  reforming  unnecessary.  The  possibil- 
ities offered  by  manual  training,  domestic  science, 
246 


THE    JUVENILE    DELINQUENT 

athletics,  nature  study,  gardening,  excursions,  vaca- 
tion schools,  drawing,  modeling,  etc.,  are  many  and 
very  inspiring  to  the  student  of  educational 
problems. 

There  are  two  phases  in  the  problem  of  the 
truant,  the  so-called  "incorrigible"  child,  or  the 
juvenile  delinquent.  First,  the  school  curriculum 
and  methods  must  be  so  modified  as  to  work  posi- 
tively and  effectively  toward  the  diminution  of 
these  forms  of  moral  disease  among  the  young. 
Secondly,  the  treatment  of  the  case  after  it  has 
reached  the  acute  stage.  Much  of  the  discussion 
in  this  book  bears  upon  the  first  phase ;  but  specific 
treatment  will  be  deferred  until  the  last  chapter. 
The  remainder  of  the  present  chapter  will  be 
devoted  to  a  consideration  of  the  "special"  school 
for  the  treatment  of  truants  and  others  who  do  not 
readily  conform  to  the  regulations  which  are  neces- 
sary in  the  public  schools  as  they  are  organized 
to-day.  Four  classes  of  such  schools  may  be  men- 
tioned,— ^the  truant,  the  day  industrial,  the  parental 
and  the  reform  school. 

The  truant  school  need  not  detain  us.  The 
truants  and  unruly  children  are  segregated  here, 
but  receive  no  special  treatment.  Little  can  be  said 
in  its  favor  except  that  it  removes  this  class  of 
children  from  the  regular  classroom.  The  next 
step  in  advance  brings  the  day  industrial  school. 
The  children  who  are  sent  to  this  school  live 
at  home,  but  are  kept  at  the  school  during  the 
greater  portion  of  the  day.  One  meal  is  usuaHy 
served  at  the  school.  The  parental  school,  however, 
247 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

represents  the  highest  and  best  in  the  treatment  oi 
the  truant.  This  is  a  combination  of  home  and 
school  under  a  single  management.  These  special 
schools  should  not  be  so  much  reformative  as  direct- 
ive. Children  requiring  special  care  and  treatmeni 
should  be  placed  in  special  schools  where  the  classes 
are  small  and  where  individual  treatment  can  be 
given.  Here  skilled  teachers  will  endeavor  tc 
preserve  for  future  good  citizenship  the  child  who 
if  left  to  his  own  devices  or  to  the  mercies  of  ar 
ungraded  school,  will  become  an-  unworthy  speci- 
men of  humanity.  These  truants  and  unruly  chil- 
dren are  misguided ;  they  need  sympathy,  intelligen 
aid  and  cooperation.  They  should  be  treated  ai 
students,  not  as  criminals.  These  future  citizen: 
must  be  cared  for  in  an  educational,  not  a  penal 
institution.  Emphasis  should  be  laid  upon  thi; 
fact.  Bolts,  bars,  locks  or  high  walls  are  not  founc 
in  the  best  institutions  of  this  character;  there  i: 
nothing  about  them  to  indicate  the  correctiona 
institution.  A  stranger  visiting  the  Chicago  Par 
ental  School,  for  example,  would  not  guess  that  i 
was  a  school  for  truants  and  morally  imperiled  chil 
dren.  In  this  school  much  stress  is  laid  upoi 
regularity  and  constant  employment.  Militar 
drill,  manual  training,  gymnastic  exercises  an( 
farm  work  are  added  to  the  curriculum  of  the  cit 
schools  of  Chicago.  "Physical  training  is  not  ; 
fad,  not  merely  beneficial,  but  a  necessity  in  th 
training  of  truants,"  writes  a  former  principal. 

The  child  always  desires  to  use  hands,  legs,  eyes 
In  the  parental  school  advantage  is  taken  of  thi 
248 


THE    JUVENILE    DELINQUENT 

desire.  Healthy  children  are  not  lazy ;  they  are 
active,  and  we  have  only  to  turn  their  activities  into 
proper  channels  under  proper  conditions  in  order 
to  utilize  them  for  the  building  of  character.  The 
changed  mental  attitude  of  the  child  who  is  given 
manual  training,  gardening  and  gymnastics  leads 
logically  to  the  conclusion  that  our  regular  ele- 
mentary-school work  should  contain  a  greater 
amount  of  this  sort  of  training.  More  careful 
experiments,  made  in  a  school  utilized  as  a  peda- 
gogical laboratory,  are  needed  in  order  that  intelli- 
gent aid  may  be  given  educators  in  their  attempts 
to  substitute  a  more  rational  system  of  training  for 
elementary-school  children  than  our  present  hap- 
hazard, pieced-together  curriculum  is  able  to  offer. 
The  ordinary  public  school  cannot  remedy  bad 
environment,  directly  at  least.  Good  results  can 
only  be  expected  in  the  majority  of  truancy  cases 
when  the  surroundings  and  daily  life  of  the  child 
are  modified  or  completely  changed.  The  parental 
school  takes  the  child  out  of  the  bad  and  familiar 
surroundings  and  thus  has  a  real  opportunity  to 
strengthen  these  morally  imperiled  children.  Proper 
treatment  of  the  young  offender  is  much  cheaper 
than  the  cost  of  the  crime  and  of  the  imprisonment 
of  the  older  delinquent;  and  if  we  are  able  to 
reclaim  the  young  boy,  a  producer,  a  worker,  is 
given  to  the  city  in  the  place  of  an  idler  and 
destroyer  Let  it  again  be  noticed  that  if  we  can 
look  no  further  than  our  pocketbooks,  and  many 
cannot,  the  argument  is  still  favorable  to  modern 
preventive  methods  in  the  treatment  of  the  young 
249 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

offender.  Retribution  and  reformation  are  to  be 
displaced  by  prevention. 

The  benefit  of  parental  schools  is  threefold. 
They  are  desirable  from  the  standpoint  of  the  good 
student,  of  the  unruly  and  truant  child,  and  of  the 
teacher.  Parental  schools  remove  a  source  of  irri- 
tation and  danger  from  the  good  and  obedient 
student ;  they  give  positive  aid  to  the  other  class  of 
students;  and,  lastly,  they  relieve  the  overburdened 
teacher.  Compulsory  education  can  never  be  a 
success  until  day  industrial  and  parental  schools 
are  added  to  the  public-school  system,  or  until  the 
ordinary  school  is  more  closely  fashioned  after  the 
parental  school.  If  the  school  system  becomes 
better  prepared  to  practically  aid  the  child,  to  take 
advantage  of  his  experience  and  desires,  the  amount 
of  truancy  and  incorrigibility  will  decrease,  as  this 
is  the  result  of  abnormal  conditions  in  school  or 
home,  or  in  both.  As  education  approaches  the  dig- 
nity of  a  science,  as  the  cumulative  effect  of  better 
schools  and  better  homes  is  felt,  generation  after 
generation,  as  our  cities  and  homes  are  made 
habitable  and  healthy,  the  truant  and  the  "incor- 
rigible" will  gradually  disappear. 

The  reform  school  is  an  institution  "necessary 
for  youth  who  have  committed  acts  which  would 
send  an  adult  to  the  state  penitentiary,  as  larceny, 
arson,  stabbing."  The  best  reformatories,  as  for 
example  the  Elmira  Reformatory,  utilize  manual 
training,  military  drill  and  regular  work.  "The 
occupations  should  be,  as  far  as  possible,  agri- 
cultural and  horticultural,  and  the  educational 
250 


THE    JUVENILE    DELINQUENT 

influences  should  tend  toward  a  career  in  the  coun- 
try. Even  for  rural  industry  the  elements  of  a 
trade  should  be  taught.  Since  many  boys  from 
cities  are  certain  to  return  to  their  homes,  a  great 
variety  of  trades  must  be  taught  to  meet  their 
wants."^ 

The  Chicago  parental  school  is  probably  one  of 
the  best  of  its  kind  in  the  world.  It  is  an  integral 
part  of  the  public-school  system.  This  school  was 
opened  in  1902.  It  is  located  in  the  northwestern 
part  of  the  city,  on  a  fifty-acre  lot,  remote  from 
the  crowded  portions  of  the  city.  The  environment 
is  practically  rural.  The  school  is  organized  on  the 
cottage  plan;  the  children  are  divided  into  groups 
of  about  thirty,  and  each  group  is  placed  in  the 
care  of  a  man  and  his  wife.  The  attempt  is  made 
to  reproduce  as  far  as  possible  real  homes  and 
family  life  in  a  good  environment.  "As  the  home 
and  social  conditions  of  the  boys  committed  to  this 
school  are  not  the  best  possible,  we  aim  to  give 
them  a  good  home  and  proper  traming  in  manners 
and  morals  as  well  as  intellectual  culture.  To  this 
end  we  are  careful  to  select,  as  family  officers,  men 
and  women  of  education  and  refinement,  and  the 
remarkable  change  in  the  deportment  of  paroled 
pupils  of  this  school,  noted  by  teachers  and  prin- 
cipals, is  largely  due  to  the  influence  of  our  'family 
instructors.'  "^  The  report  states :  "What  these 
boys  most  need  is  good  diet  and  hygienic  exercise. 
We   emphasize   our   dietary."     Food,   environment 

'  Henderson,  Dependents,  Defectives,  Delinquents,  p.  239. 
'  First  Annual  Report  of  the  Chicago  Parental  School. 
251 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

and  physical  exercise, — if  these  three  elements  act 
beneficially  upon  the  child,  half  of  his  battle  of  life 
is  won.  Only  a  small  percentage  of  children  who 
are  improperly  nourished,  whose  environment  is 
depressing  or  demoralizing,  or  who  have  little 
opportunity  for  healthful  physical  exercise  and 
work,  can  hope  to  rise  above  the  level  of  their  sur- 
roundings. We  talk  much  about  equality  of  oppor- 
tunity in  education,  but  we  often  overlook  the  facts 
in  the  case.  The  real  value  of  the  parental  school 
lies  in  placing  the  child  in  a  good  environment, 
feeding  him  in  a  wholesome  and  simple  manner, 
and  providing  work  and  regular  exercise  for  him. 
The  George  Junior  Republic,  about  which  so  much 
has  been  written,  is  in  reality  a  private  parental 
school.  The  experience  of  this  school  adds  to  the 
testimony  as  to  the  value  and  necessity  of  regular 
occupation  and  wholesome  environmental  conditions. 
In  Cook  County  jail,  Chicago,  the  author  once 
witnessed  a  most  pathetic  sight.  In  an  upper  room 
of  that  grim  and  forbidding  structure  some  twenty- 
five  or  thirty  juvenile  criminals  were  being  given 
military  drill,  light  gymnastic  exercises  and  instruc- 
tion in  vocal  music.  The  squad  was  in  charge  of 
the  matron  of  the  institution,  assisted  by  two  or 
three  inmates.  Jailor  Whitman  remarked,  "These 
boys  have  no  idea  of  right  living."  They  were 
criminals  because  of  their  environment  and  lack  of 
proper  training.  Mr.  Whitman  firmly  believed  that 
this  daily  drill  and  exercise,  teaching  them  to  act 
in  unison  with  others  and  to  move  with  preci- 
sion, would  be  of  much  benefit  to  these  young 
252 


THE    JUVENILE    DELINQUENT 

unfortunates  who  were  temporarily  in  his  charge. 
What  a  social  waste,  because  the  proper  formation 
of  these  young  minds  has  been  neglected ! 

"The  evils  of  poverty  are  not  barren,  but  pro- 
creative;  the  workers  in  poverty  are,  in  spite  of 
themselves,  giving  to  the  world  a  litter  of  misera- 
bles,  whose  degeneracy  is  so  stubborn  and  fixed 
that  reclamation  is  almost  impossible,  especially 
when  the  only  process  of  reclamation  must  consist 
m  trying  to  force  the  pauper,  vagrant  and  weakling 
back  mto  that  struggle  with  poverty  which  is  all 
the  time  defeating  stronger  and  better  natures."^ 
The  improvement  of  the  environmental  conditions 
in  our  cities  and  villages  will  conduce  to  a  lower 
birth  rate  for  those  populations  who  now  have  an 
undesirably  large  one.  Misery  and  a  high  birth  rate 
are  boon  companions.  The  proper  enlargement 
and  exercise  of  the  true  functions  of  public  educa- 
tion are  at  the  root  of  the  economic  and  social 
betterment  of  modern  democratic  society. 

*  Hunter,  Poverty,  Preface. 


253 


CHAPTER    XIV 
NEW   EDUCATIONAL   PROJECTS 

This  chapter  is  devoted  to  a  discussion  of  certain 
recent  actual  or  proposed  extensions  of  the  func- 
tions of  the  school — innovations  which  tend  par- 
ticularly to  enlarge  its  social  character.  These  new 
functions  are  typical  of  the  democratizing  tend- 
encies in  modern  education.  As  yet,  they  are  nearly 
all  in  the  experimental  stage,  and  have  by  no  means 
attained  the  full  measure  of  service  which  may  be 
expected  of  them.  The  active  propaganda  in  favor 
of  the  parental  school,  the  continuation  school,  and 
the  various  educational  innovations  discussed  in 
this  chapter  marked  the  opening  of  the  fourth  period 
in  our  educational  history.  These  educational  inno- 
vations are  clearly  semi-socialistic  in  their  nature, 
and  several  of  them  have  received  the  support  of 
a  new  social  power, — the  women's  organizations. 
A  severe  crisis  or  long-continued  trade  depression 
would  probably  cause  the  public  to  direct  its  atten- 
tion toward  the  school  and  would  so  crystallize 
public  sentiment  that  the  majority  of  these  addi- 
tional educational  functions  would  soon  become 
permanently  added  to  the  work  of  the  public  school, 
instead  of  being  supported  in  a  half-hearted  way 
or  of  standing  in  danger  of  being  discontinued  or 
254 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

curtailed  with  'jvery  change  of  school  administra- 
tion. New  educational  projects  which  the  present 
era  makes  desirable  are  opposed,  as  has  always 
been  the  case  in  educational  history,  by  the  imme- 
diate economic  interests  of  the  taxpayer  on  the  one 
hand,  and  on  the  other  by  the  conservatism  and 
apathy  of  the  great  mass  of  the  people,  which  of 
course  includes  the  taxpayers.  Only  when  indus- 
trial and  commercial  conditions  become  unpro- 
pitious  does  a  demand  arise  on  the  part  of  the 
masses  which  breaks  down  all  barriers.  In  the 
early  era  of  educational  advance  in  the  nineteenth 
century,  progress  was  checked  by  the  continual 
westward  emigration,  the  slavery  agitation  and 
communistic  projects.  The  attention  of  the  people 
was  drawn  from  the  question  of  education  into 
other  channels.  To-day  the  greatest  danger  from 
reactionary  tendencies  seems  to  lie  in  imperialism, 
— in  the  overshadowing  of  local  issues  by  foreign 
politics. 

The  School  as  a  Social  Center  and  a 
Playground 
The  school  of  the  future  is  to  be  an  almost  con- 
tinuous affair,  with  functions  which  vary  with  the 
time  of  day  and  the  season  of  the  year.     In  a  score 
or  two  of  years  the  present  functions  of  the  school 
will  be  looked  upon  as  rudimentary,  as  representing 
an  early  stage  in  the  development  of  the  economic 
and    social   duties   which   properly  belong  to   this 
important  institution  of  society.     Social  intercourse 
with   others   and  play-activity   are   now   generally 
255 


»/ 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

recognized  as  two  vital  constructive  factors  in  the 
education  of  young  men  and  women ;  but  boards  of 
education  and  teachers  have  not  all  as  yet  recog- 
nized that  the  school  should  consider  and  actively 
direct  these  two  educative  activities.  In  earlier 
generations  supervision  was  perhaps  unnecessary; 
but  crowding  into  cities  has  placed  great  restric- 
tions upon  these  essential  activities,  or  has  caused 
them  to  be  carried  on  in  such  a  manner  and  under 
such  auspices  that  they  become  instruments  which 
promote  an  abnormal  rather  than  a  normal  and 
healthy  development.  The  evil  has  been  recognized 
for  many  years ;  but  the  remedy  and  the  method  of 
applying  a  remedy  were  not  so  apparent.  Many 
have  seen  clearly  the  evils  of  the  street  gang,  the 
saloon,  and  the  dance  hall,  for  example,  and  have 
immediately  cried  out  for  suppression  of  the  evil 
by  the  hand  of  the  law.  They  would  remove  the 
eflfect,  but  leave  unchanged  and  unaffected  the 
causes  which  have  brought  these  crying  evils  into 
being.  Crime,  vice,  disease,  inefficiency  and  pau- 
perism are  produced,  of  course,  by  no  single, 
glaring  cause,  but  rather  by  a  multitude  of  forces 
of  various  kinds.  These  evils  are  but  the  outward 
and  signal  manifestations  of  social  maladjustments 
which  are  not  visible  to  the  impulsive  and  super- 
ficial observer.  Mere  repression  is  only  an  external 
remedy,  and  usually  a  very  inefficient  one.  The 
wise  social  physician  must  look  beyond  consequence 
to  cause.  Curative  measures  are  desirable;  but  in 
preventive  measures  lies  the  hope  of  the  world. 
Professor  Patten  has  pointed  out  the  line  of  least 
256 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

resistance  in  words  which  ought  to  be  burned  deeply 
into  the  memory  of  every  one  interested  in  human 
progress  and  in  world  betterment:  "Vice  must 
first  be  fought  by  welfare,  not  by  restraint;  and 
society  is  not  safe  until  to-day's  pleasures  are 
stronger  than  its  temptations.  .  .  .  Amusement  is 
stronger  than  vice  and  can  stifle  the  lust  of  it," 

Of  all  the  forces  which  are  inducing  these  social 
maladies  we  are,  in  this  section,  particularly  con- 
cerned with  the  two  which  grow  out  of  the 
unnatural  perversion  of  the  desire  for  and  the 
necessity  of  play  and  social  intercourse.  Street 
gangs  are  natural  products  of  the  innate  need  of 
exercise,  and  of  meeting  with  one's  fellows.  So 
far  this  is  natural  and  therefore  good;  the  evil 
creeps  in  chiefly  on  account  of  the  conditions  which 
obtain  in  cities,  and  in  villages  as  well,  and  because 
few  attempts  have  been  made  to  intelligently  turn 
the  activities  of  this  group  of  young  people  into 
healthful  and  beneficial  channels.  The  newsboys 
of  a  large  city  are  usually  addicted  to  swearing, 
smoking,  petty  gambling  and  perhaps  petty  thiev- 
ing. The  street  is  their  training  school — in  many 
cases  their  home.  Many  unthinking  people  would 
probably  say  that  the  majority  of  the  street  boys 
were  "hopeless" ;  yet  Mr.  John  Gunckel  of  Toledo 
has  organized  the  newsboys  of  that  city  in  such  a 
masterful  way  that  many  of  the  faults  and  frailties 
of  the  average  newsboy  have  been  overcome.  He 
has  worked  faithfully  year  in  and  year  out;  he  has 
held  meetings  for  the  newsboys,  has  organized  a 
union  and  various  minor  clubs  and  associations. 
17  257 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

This  gentleman  has  succeeded  in  building  up  a  pub- 
lic opinion  among  this  class  of  boys  in  that  city  which 
is  good  and  which  augers  well  for  their  future.  The 
energy,  the  ambition,  the  impulse,  the  ideals  were 
all  there  before  Mr,  Gunckel  took  hold  of  this  work ; 
he  skilfully  directed  the  boys  away  from  the 
breakers  of  crime  and  profanity  into  the  quieter 
waters  of  higher  ideals  and  nobler  aspirations. 
This  is  not  easily  done;  but,  the  point  is,  it  can  be 
done,  and  it  pays  the  community  to  have  it  done. 

The  saloon  and  the  dance  hall,  against  which 
so  much  is  said,  are  places  where  adults  and  young 
people  congregate  for  social  enjoyment  and  diver- 
sion. The  industrial  worker,  tied  down  for  long 
hours  to  a  monotonous,  ceaseless  repetition  of 
simple  movements,  comes  home  to  a  small  house 
crowded  with  people  o"^  various  ages;  a  poorly 
cooked  and  badly  served  meal  is  hastily  swallowed. 
This  disposed  of,  the  tired  worker  finds  no  place 
within  the  home  where  friends  may  be  taken,  no 
opportunity  to  play  games,  or  even  perhaps  no 
quiet  corner  in  which  to  read  a  book  or  a  magazine. 
What  happens?  He  or  she  goes  outside  the  home 
for  comfort,  for  social  enjoyment  and  for  diversion. 
The  saloon,  the  poolroom,  the  cheap  theater  and 
the  dance  hall  stand  open  and  aggressively  invite 
all  comers.  They  are  warm,  well-lighted  and  com- 
fortable. Unless  a  substitute  can  be  furnished  for 
these  features  of  city  life,  so  long  will  the  youths  and 
adults  be  drawn  into  the  net  which  drags  them  down. 
The  degrading  and  demoralizing  influences  of  our 
city  life  have  been  made  so  cheap  that  there  are  few 
?58 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

too  poor  to  partake  of  them.  The  ennobling  and 
uplifting  influences  are,  alas,  usually  expensive. 
In  modern  life  the  individual  is  so  helpless ;  he  is 
bound  and  restrained  in  a  thousand  ways.  Society 
must  provide  those  things  which  he  needs  but 
cannot  obtain  unaided.  Without  the  aid  of  many 
collective  agencies  the  life  of  the  city  dwellers 
must  become  barren  and  unprogressive.  These 
impulses  and  these  human  needs,  which  are  products 
of  the  historic  or  pre-historic  past,  are  not  to  be 
readily  and  completely  changed;  they  must  be 
accepted  and  turned  to  good  use.  Society  as  a 
whole  is  to-day  in  a  large  measure  responsible  for 
the  development  of  each  and  every  individual;  its 
institution,  the  public  school,  must  take  up  the 
work  of  providing  opportunity  for  social  inter- 
course and  play.  It  should  take  up  the  work  which 
many  social  settlements  and  playground  associa- 
tions have  started.  Make  the  schoolhouse  and  the 
"field  house"  community  centers. 

New  York  City  has  taken  the  lead  in  this  matter. 
In  that  city,  during  the  recent  winter,  many  of  the 
public-school  buildings  were  kept  open.  "Several 
thousand  boys  and  girls  over  fourteen  were  enter- 
tained in  them  with  basketball,  gymnastics,  checkers, 
ping-pong,  picture  books,  dancing,  and  club  meet- 
ings." In  the  summer  many  more  are  open  in  the 
afternoon  for  "games  and  light  manual  instruction." 
The  roofs  of  the  school  buildings  have  also  been 
utilized  in  the  summer  for  children  to  play  games 
and  dance  to  simple  music.  Enthusiastic  temper- 
ance workers  and  reformers  of  many  kinds  have  a 
?5P 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

promising  field  for  work  if  they  will  preach  stead- 
fastly the  gospel  of  the  community  center  as  a 
public-school  function. 

I  At  the  annual  convention  of  the  American  Fed- 
eration of  Labor  in  1904,  President  Gompers  pro- 
:  posed  that  the  local  labor  unions  ask  for  permission 
to  meet  in  the  public-school  buildings.  If  labor 
unions  and  clubs  and  societies  of  various  kinds  are 
to  meet  in  the  school  buildings,  if  the  children  are 
to  come  here  in  the  evening  to  play  games,  if  read- 
ing  rooms  are  to  be  established,  some  modifications 
from  the  conventional  schoolhouse  plans  must  of 
course  follow.  Each  building  must  have  at  least 
one  assembly  room  or  lecture  hall.  The  desks  must 
be  so  fastened  that  they  can  be  easily  removed. 
(The  teaching  and  janitor  force  must  be  enlarged. 
But  the  expense  will  be  slight  in  comparison  with 
the  results  to  be  anticipated. 

The  school  garden  is  another  innovation  which 
has  been  tried  in  some  of  the  eastern  cities.  This 
is  merely  an  extension  of  the  manual-training 
movement,  and  offers  a  good  opportunity  to  corre- 
late it  with  nature  study.  Nearly  every  city  has 
many  vacant  lots  which  might  be  profitably  utilized 
by  the  school  authorities  for  playgrounds  and  school 
gardens.  When  we  have  accepted  the  view  that 
manual  training,  nature  study,  agriculture  and 
many  other  new  subjects  are  necessary  in  our 
school  curriculum,  we  can  hardly  avoid  adding  to 
the  list  of  school  activities  directed  play,  vacation 
schools,  lecture  courses  and  reading  rooms.  They 
follow  logically  as  a  matter  of  course. 
260 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

Mr.  Hearne  has  told  us  that  in  Japan  the  local 
temple  grounds  are  utilized  as  places  of  amuse- 
ment; festivals  and  various  social  functions  of  the 
people  are  held  here.  Children  at  all  times  use  the 
temple  groves  and  grounds  as  playgrounds.  In 
this  respect,  what  the  temple  and  its  grounds  are 
to  the  Japanese,  the  school  and  its  yard  should 
become  to  the  American  youth.  As  the  Japanese 
entwine  their  religion  and  their  temples  into  their 
daily  life,  so  should  we  of  the  Occident  make  edu- 
cation and  the  school  a  part  and  parcel  of  our 
social  and  industrial  life. 

In  Prussia,  in  1897,  ^^  least  2,000  schools  had 
public  play  and  gymnastics  combined.  In  German 
cities  the  school  authorities  hire  teachers  to  "guide 
the  children  in  their  games,  suggest  new  ones, 
decide  disputes,  answer  questions  with  regard  to 
things  new  to  the  children,  and  make  themselves 
generally  useful  without  becoming  oppressive  by 
exercising  school  authority."  In  Boston  a  number 
of  the  school  buildings  have  been  thrown  open  for 
free  lectures  and  concerts,  and  in  one  school  at 
least  rooms  have  been  thrown  open  in  the  evening 
for  the  purposes  of  study.  One  of  the  teachers  is 
present  to  preserve  order  and  render  assistance. 
Germany  has  advanced  so  far  along  this  road  that 
teachers  are  being  trained  in  normal  schools  of  play. 
In  Toledo  the  municipal  authorities  give  sleigh- 
rides  to  the  younger  school  children.  Horses  and 
bob-sleds  belonging  to  the  city  departments  are 
utilized  for  this  purpose.  In  the  winter  some  cities 
flood  the  playgrounds  and  convert  them  into  public 
261 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

skating  rinks.  Professor  Zueblin  states  that  in 
Chicago,  during  the  winter  of  1 901 -1902,  "no 
fewer  than  two  hundred"  municipal  skating  rinks 
were  established.  Many  vacant  lots  were  utilized 
for  the  purpose.  It  is  estimated  that  in  1907 
Chicago  possessed  over  ninety-three  acres  of  play- 
grounds ;  Philadelphia,  one  hundred  and  ten  acres ; 
and  Boston,  two  hundred  acres,  A  physician  esti- 
mates that  "the  city  of  Philadelphia  spends  more 
resources  and  employs  more  agents  in  the  interests 
of  public  health  to-day  than  did  the  whole  English- 
speaking  world  a  century  ago."^  The  gymnasium, 
physical  training,  athletics  and  organized  play  are 
rapidly  becoming  integral  parts  of  our  educational 
work  both  for  adults  and  for  the  young. 

Closely  connected  with  the  increasing  importance 
of  the  school  as  a  playground  and  a  social  center, 
and  supplementing  its  work,  is  the  movement  to 
provide  free  public  baths  and  free  concerts  for  the 
public.  Municipal  baths  are  now  maintained  by 
many  cities.  In  BrookHne,  Massachusetts,  pro- 
vision is  made  in  the  high-school  program  for 
swimmmg  during  school  hours.  Squads  are  sent 
twice  a  week  to  the  municipal  bath  houses.  The 
boys  are  sent  in  the  forenoon  and  the  girls  in  the 
afternoon.  In  both  Chicago  and  Toledo  the  free 
band  concert  has  proved  a  boon  to  thousands  of 
people  on  hot,  sultry  summer  evenings  and  after- 
noons. The  school  buildings  could  also  be  utilized 
in  the  winter  for  indoor  concerts,  at  very  little 
expense.     The    old    medieval    conception    of    the 

*R.  C.  Newton,  Popular  Science  Monthly,  August,  1907. 
262 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

worthlessness  of  the  human  body  is  rapidly  passing. 
The  first  decade  of  the  twentieth  century  is  indeed 
witnessing  the  "renaissance  of  the  physical  con- 
science." The  school  is  no  longer  a  mere  "brain 
refinery" ;  education  is  now  "humaniculture."  Mod- 
ern industry,  with  its  routine  work,  its  sedentary 
occupations  and  its  growing  cities,  coupled  with 
increasing  leisure  for  all  workers,  has  forced  the 
problem  of  physical  training  and  of  amusement 
upon  society.  An  industrial  people  which  neglects 
these  essentials  must  inevitably  perish.  The  early 
and  crude  attempts  at  the  solution  of  the  problem 
have  been  chiefly  the  results  of  a  blind  outcropping 
of  the  instinct  of  racial  preservation,  joined  with  a 
humanitarian  impulse  stirred  by  the  sight  of  the 
crowded  and  cheerless  city.  The  hopeful  and 
important  results  which  have  already  been  achieved 
presage  that  a  great  forward  step  will  follow  a 
systematic  and  scientific  study  of  this  problem. 

The  Utilization  of  the  Summer  Vacation 
The  rise  of  the  vacation  school  is  significant  for 
two  reasons.  First,  it  emphasizes  the  desirability 
of  play,  manual  training  and  contact  with  nature  as 
a  part  of  our  educational  scheme.  Text-books  are 
rarely  used  in  a  vacation  school ;  books  are  only 
referred  to  as  the  necessity  arises,  or  as  the  child 
feels  the  desire  for  further  instruction  in  regard  to 
some  particular  subject.  Secondly,  the  vacation 
school  is  an  attempt  to  fill  up  a  gap,  during 
the  summer,  which  modern  industrial  conditions 
have  created.  A  rural  community  has  little  need 
263 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

ordinarily  for  a  vacation  school.  When  the  inhabit- 
ants of  the  United  States  were  almost  wholly  rural, 
the  long  summer  vacation  was  utilized  by  placing 
the  young  people  at  work  on  the  farm,  while  the 
younger  children  busied  themselves  the  entire  day 
in  play  in  the  open  air.  Economic  and  climatic 
conditions  conspired  to  produce  the  long  summer 
vacation, — a  very  desirable  feature  in  the  physical, 
industrial  and  intellectual  education  of  the  time. 
Eventually  it  came  to  be  a  dogma  that  the  intel- 
lectual worker,  young  or  old,  needed  a  long  rest 
each  year.  Under  city  and  village  conditions  these 
advantages  in  a  large  measure  disappear ;  the  vaca- 
tion degenerates  into  a  period  of  demoralization 
instead  of  one  of  rest,  or  rather  of  desirable  and 
beneficial  change  of  occupation.  As  a  result,  the 
vacation  school,  the  summer  camp  or  excursion  to 
the  country  for  the  young,  and  the  summer  school 
for  the  older  students,  have  become  well-known 
institutions,  and  are  destined  to  secure  permanent 
places  in  our  educational  system.  The  harvest 
field  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  restriction  of  the 
function  of  the  school  to  purely  intellectual  drill 
and  discipline  on  the  other,  can  no  longer  be  offered 
as  valid  excuses  or  sufficient  reasons  for  the  con- 
tinued adherence  to  the  traditional  school  and  col- 
lege calendar. 

The  first  vacation  school  was  established  in 
Boston  in  1885.  Many  other  cities  soon  followed ; 
but  all  of  the  early  schools  were  established  by 
private  initiative.  In  1899  vacation  schools  were 
established  in  New  York  City  under  the  supervision 
264 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

of  the  Board  of  Education.  Such  schools  had 
already  been  maintained  for  four  summers  under 
the  auspices  of  various  private  associations.  In 
1902,  32  school  buildings  were  utilized  for  this 
purpose  with  an  average  attendance  of  12,916 
pupils;  in  1903,  the  figures  were  increased  to  54 
and  18,927  respectively;  but  in  1904,  for  financial 
reasons,  only  39  buildings  were  utilized  during  the 
summer,  with  an  average  attendance  of  17,446 
pupils.  The  total  expenditures  for  the  vacation 
schools  of  this  city  were  $42,751.44  in  1902, 
$122,121.30  in  1903,  and  $73,847.77  in  1904.* 
These  items  form  only  a  very  small  part  of  the  total 
expenditures  for  the  schools  of  New  York  City, 
which  were  $27,848,853.16  in  1903-1904. 

A  typical  program  of  work  in  a  vacation  school 
usually  allows  about  forty  minutes  each  for  such 
subjects  as  nature  study,  drawing,  music  and  gym- 
nastics, gardening,  manual  training  or  sewing. 
Vacation  schools  are  desirable  both  from  the  edu- 
cational and  the  economic  point  of  view.  They  are 
in  all  respects  cheaper  and  better  than  reform 
schools,  and  are  made  desirable,  as  are  playgrounds, 
on  account  of  the  crowded  conditions  of  our  cities. 
The  vacation  school  illustrates  another  form  of 
encroachment  on  the  part  of  the  school  upon  the 
former  functions  of  the  home  and  of  the  play- 
ground. At  least  one  great  university,  Chicago, 
has  fully  recognized  the  uselessness  of  the  long 
summer  vacation.  This  university  divides  its  school 
year  into  four  quarters  of  twelve  weeks  each.     The 

*  Palmer,  The  New  York  Public  Schools. 
265 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

work  of  the  summer  quarter  counts  towards  a 
degree  exactly  as  does  the  work  of  any  other  quar- 
ter. By  attending  during  the  entire  four  quarters 
of  each  year,  students  may  complete  the  usual  four- 
year  college  or  undergraduate  course  in  three  years. 

The  School  City 
By  means  of  the  school  city  an  attempt  is  made 
to  give  the  children,  in  a  practical  manner,  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  functions  and  the  problems  of  govern- 
ment, particularly  of  local  government,  and  to 
illustrate  the  duties  and  obligations  of  citizens 
whether  of  a  school  or  a  city  community.  The 
plan,  as  now  usually  carried  out,  is  said  to  have 
originated  in  the  mind  of  Mr.  Wilson  L.  Gill.  It 
has  been  tried  in  several  different  cities,  among 
which  are  Philadelphia,  Chicago  and  Toledo. 
Mr.  Gill  was  invited  to  Cuba  by  General  Leonard 
Wood,  and  spent  some  time  introducing  the  system 
into  the  schools  of  that  island.  The  apparent  suc- 
cess of  the  George  Junior  Republic,  which  is 
managed  on  a  self-governing  basis,  has  led  many 
other  institutions  to  pattern  after  it.  The  real, 
although  most  forgotten,  prototype  of  the  school 
city  is  probably  Fellenberg's  school  at  Hofwyl, 
Switzerland.  Fellenberg  was  an  educator  of  great 
merit  whose  name  is  worthy  of  being  ranked 
alongside,  if  not  above,  those  of  Pestalozzi  and 
Froebel.  The  school  at  Hofwyl  was  organized  in 
1805,  and  contmued  in  operation  until  the  death  of 
its  founder  and  master  over  forty  years  later. 
Robert  Dale  Owen  was  a  student  in  this  school. 
266 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

This  distinguished  pupil  gives  the  following  descrip- 
tion of  the  government  of  the  institution:  "We 
were  proud  that  our  republic  had  no  laws  but  those 
we  ourselves  had  made.  It  had  its  council  of  leg- 
islation, its  courts  of  judges,  its  civil  and  military 
officers,  and  its  public  treasury.  It  had  its  annual 
elections  by  ballot,  at  which  each  student  had  a 
vote;  its  privileges  and  honors  equally  accessible  to 
all ;  its  labors  and  duties  shared  by  all."^  Later  in 
its  history  these  formal  methods  were  cast  aside  as 
cumbersome  and  unwieldy,  but  the  spirit  of  the 
institution  was  unchanged. 

The  school  city  tries  to  impress  upon  the  children 
the  idea  that  they  are  participants  and  sharers  in 
the  duties  and  responsibilities  of  the  school  com- 
munity. Emphasis  is  laid  upon  the  rights  and 
privileges  of  others,  upon  the  necessity  of  coopera- 
tion in  keeping  the  school  building  and  school  yard 
clean  and  neat,  upon  the  fact  that  the  school  prop- 
erty is  their  property  and  that  they  are  responsible 
for  its  proper  use.  The  school  city  tries,  through 
its  governmental  machinery,  to  create  a  strong  pub- 
lic sentiment  in  favor  of  law  and  order.  It  makes 
plain  to  the  student  body  the  simple  proposition 
that  the  noisy  and  disobedient  student  violates  the 
rights  of  others, — that  the  boy  who  cuts  his  desk 
or  destroys  shrubbery  in  the  school  yard  is  destroy- 
ing the  property  of  the  entire  school  community. 
In  short,  it  is  a  "moral  and  civic  apprenticeship." 

*  R.  D.  Owen,  Threading  My  Way:  An  Autobiography, 
pp.  152-3. 

267 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

Any  means  which  can  genuinely  and  permanently 
interest  the  student  in  current  events  or  in  local, 
state  and  national  administration  and  government, 
is  very  desirable.  The  school  city  is,  in  reality,  an 
extension  of  the  laboratory  method.  By  means  of 
it  teachers  try  to  form  good  citizens ;  they  train 
students  on  an  experimental  stage  where  many  of 
the  conditions  are  prescribed  in  advance.  It  is, 
however,  the  spirit  rather  than  the  machinery  upon 
which  the  emphasis  must  be  laid.  The  skilful 
teacher  should  never  relax  his  authority,  but  must 
gradually  mold  public  opinion  in  the  school  so  as 
to  bring  about  the  desired  result.  The  possibilities 
and  chances  of  success  also  seem  to  be  greater  in 
the  elementary  than  in  the  high  school.  In  the 
latter,  unless  very  skilfully  managed  by  the  prin- 
cipal and  teachers,  it  is  often  considered  by  the 
students  to  be  a  sort  of  play  government  and  is 
liable  to  receive  only  a  sort  of  contemptuous 
allegiance.  At  least  this  was  the  result  of  expe- 
rience in  Toledo.  One  of  the  best  ward  schools  in 
that  city  has  been  operated  for  several  years  as  a 
school  city.  Among  the  officers  are  a  mayor,  coun- 
,  cilmen,  and  sanitary  and  health  officers.  The 
result  has  been  good,  but  the  system  has  not  been 
extended  to  the  other  ward  schools.  The  Toledo 
University  School,  of  high-school  grade,  tried  the 
school-city  plan  for  two  years,  and  the  result  may 
undoubtedly  be  counted  a  complete  failure.  The 
superintendent  lost  control  of  the  mechanism,  and 
the  would-be  young  orator  was  given  too  great  an 
268 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

opportunity.  The  necessary  interest  and  school 
sentiment  were  not  aroused. 

There  is  danger  to-day,  in  this  age  of  world-wide 
politics  and  international  interests,  of  overlooking 
or  neglecting  the  near-by,  the  home  community, 
and  local  welfare  and  interests;  there  is  a  danger 
of  abandoning  rigid  inspection  of  local  matters 
because  of  an  appeal  to  larger,  more  distant  affairs. 
At  this  time,  when  the  air  is  filled  with  rumors  of 
imperialistic  policies,  it  is  well  for  the  school  to  lay 
emphasis  upon  the  forms  of  local  government;  it 
is  right  that  the  school  should  train  the  young  men 
and  women  intrusted  to  its  care  to  take  an  active 
interest  in  local  matters,  and  to  understand  the 
machinery  of  the  local  government.  If  the  local 
government  is  kept  pure  and  efficient,  the  state  and 
national  government  will  also  be  honest  and 
efficient. 

If  the  school  city  can  give  to  the  child  of  the 
immigrant  a  true  conception  of  the  plan  upon  which 
our  government  rests,  truly  a  great  work  will  be 
accomplished.  Heretofore  their  great  teacher,  and 
the  teacher  of  many  native  Americans  as  well,  has 
been  the  too  well-known  ward  "boss."  From  him 
the  future  American  citizen  has  learned  the  lessons 
of  civic  duty  and  of  civic  ideals.  Only  one  institu- 
tion, and  that  not  a  public  but  a  private  one, — 
the  labor  union, — has  really  taught  the  lesson  of 
democratic  government.  The  trade  union  has  been 
and  is  a  great  Americanizing  and  unifying  force. 
But  even  the  labor  union  has  taken  on  some  of  the 
undesirable  features  of  our  oolitical  institutions. 
269 


I.NDUS  TRIAL    EVOLUTION 

The  "boss"  and  the  "machine"  have  found  lodg- 
ment in  the  management  of  this  most  democratic 
of  institutions.  And  is  this  not  to  be  expected  as 
long  as  our  present  condition  of  low  civic  morality 
continues?  The  trade  union  has  been  the  great 
school  of  modern  democracy  to  thousands;  but  it 
labors  under  certain  disadvantages  which  do  not 
affect  the  school.  Two  of  these  disadvantages  may 
well  be  mentioned;  the  labor  union  is  at  present 
necessarily  a  fighting  organization,  or  at  least  it 
must  be  prepared  for  industrial  warfare,  and  it 
deals  with  the  adults  whose  opinions  and  ideals  are 
not  as  easily  modified  as  those  of  school  children. 

Whether  the  school-city  plan  be  generally  adopted 
or  not,  the  fact  remains  that  the  school  ought  to 
display  greater  activity  in  regard  to  the  practical 
teaching  of  good  citizenship.  Something  more  con- 
crete and  real  should  be  given  than  mere  platitudes 
regarding  liberty  and  freedom.  Duties,  rather  than 
rights,  ought  to  receive  the  greatest  attention.  We 
hear  much  about  the  sacred  rights  of  the  free 
American  citizen ;  but  there  is  an  ominous  silence 
upon  the  subject  of  the  sacred  duties  of  the  same 
individual.  The  right  of  the  ballot  is  made  the 
chief  feature  of  every  talk  to  the  student  upon 
citizenship ;  but  not  so  frequently  are  they  told  of 
the  imperative  duty  to  vote,  and  to  vote  for  what 
they  conceive  to  be  the  best  principles  or  the  best 
man.  The  school  city  is  right  in  principle  because 
it  employs  the  laboratory  method.  It  substitutes 
doing  for  passive  assimilation  of  grandiloquent 
phrases.  It  is  still  in  the  experimental  stage,  but  is 
270 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

worthy  of  further  study  and  consideration.  In  pro- 
portion, however,  to  the  density  of  population,  to 
the  extension  of  the  market  area,  to  the  multipli- 
cation of  interstate  and  international  relations,  to 
the  centralization  of  industry  and  to  the  growing 
inequality  in  the  distribution  of  wealth,  the  com- 
plexity of  the  duties  of  citizenship  increases,  and 
the  necessity  of  training  for  citizenship  becomes 
important. 

School  Savings  Banks 

According  to  statistics  which  have  been  gathered 
on  this  subject,  there  are  about  eight  hundred  pub- 
lic school  savings  banks  in  the  United  States.  The 
number  of  depositors  on  January,  1905,  was  nearly 
ninety-one  thousand.  The  total  deposits  for  the 
year  1904  were  $1,367,930,  or  an  average  of  a  little 
over  $150  for  each  depositor.  Los  Angeles  ranked 
first  in  the  number  of  banks,  namely  fifty-three. 
The  school  savings  system  has  been  tried  in  more 
than  a  hundred  cities,  among  the  number  being 
Los  Angeles ;  Pittsburg ;  New  York ;  Lynn,  Massa- 
chusetts ;  Toledo ;  Grand  Rapids ;  and  Evanston, 
Illinois.  The  first  bank  of  this  sort  is  said  to  have 
been  established  in*  France  in  1834.  Mr.  J.  H. 
Thiry,  of  Long  Island  City,  first  introduced  the 
system  into  the  United  States. 

What  are  the  merits  and  demerits  of  the  school 
savings-bank  system?  Many  wealthy  and  self- 
made  men  of  to-day  are  very  liberal  with  advice; 
they  tell  and  reiterate  to  the  rising  generation  the 
story  of  how  they  started  on  a  dollar  a  day,  how 
271 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

by  careful  frugality  and  the  saving  of  their  pennies 
they  became  rich  and  influential.  Viewed  in  the 
light  of  such  testimony,  coupled  with  these  old 
id'eals  of  success,  the  school  savings  bank  is  an 
extremely  desirable  and  important  department  of 
school  work.  If,  however,  we  examine  the  matter, 
if  we  trace  the  career  of  these  "self-made"  men,  it 
is  usually  discovered  that  exploitation  of  natural 
resources,  or  the  ownership  of  valuable  privileges 
or  franchises  rather  than  mere  frugality  furnished 
the  real  foundations  of  their  wealth  getting.  To- 
day, by  mere  saving  neither  the  wage-earner  nor 
the  average  salaried  man  can  become  well-to-do. 
Conditions  are  totally  different  now  from  those 
of  a  quarter-  or  a  half-century  ago.  Advice  based 
upon  the  experience  of  a  half-century  ago  is  not 
exactly  pertinent  to  the  situation  to-day.  The 
school  saving  system  and  its  value  must  be  judged 
in  the  light  of  present  conditions. 

The  wage-earner  and  the  salaried  man  of  to-day 
are  obliged  in  a  large  measure  to  place  dependence 
upon  insurance  rather  than  upon  savings.  The  pen- 
sioning of  policemen,  firemen,  teachers,  railway  men 
and  industrial  workers  are  live  topics  in  political 
and  industrial  circles.  An  extension  of  public 
activity  along  this  line  is  probable  in  the  future. 
Thrift  is  still,  however,  a  highly  desirable  personal 
characteristic.  The  main  value  of  the  school  sav- 
ings system  appears  to  lie  in  the  elimination  of  the 
small,  useless  and  harmful  expenditures  for  such 
articles  as  candy  or  cigarettes,  or  for  such  amuse- 
ments as  pool  playing  or  cheap  theaters.  It  should 
272 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

aim  at  improving  consumption,  rather  than  at  the 
teaching  of  mere  saving  in  order  to  see  the  dollars 
accumulate.  By  accumulating  considerable  sums, 
relatively  speaking,  consumption  will  be  directed 
naturally  into  better  channels.  A  large  sum  is  much 
more  likely  to  be  spent  in  a  beneficial  manner  than 
are  smaller  sums;  consumption  is  in  such  cases 
improved  by  postponing  it.  Again,  the  man  who 
has  saved  a  little,  who  has  acquired  the  com- 
mendable habit  of  looking  a  little  way  into  the 
future,  is  more  independent  than  the  one  who  has 
not,  and  who  is  living  from  hand  to  mouth. 

If  the  school  savings  system  will  lead  to  the 
development  among  the  pupils  of  a  habit  of  calcula- 
tion, of  counting  the  cost,  it  will  be  worth  the 
trouble  and  extra  labor  which  must  be  incurred 
where  it  is  made  a  part  of  the  public-school  work. 
If  it  can  be  utilized  to  aid  in  doing  away  with  the 
undesirable  system  of  buying  on  credit  to  which  so 
many  wage-earners  cling,  it  will  indeed  be  a  valuable 
addition  to  the  functions  of  the  school.  The  old 
hackneyed  arguments  in  favor  of  a  school  savings- 
bank  system  should  be  cast  upon  the  scrap  heap. 
These  arguments  may  have  been  valid  a  generation 
or  two  ago,  but  to  urge  them  in  good  faith  to-day 
is  to  exhibit  narrowness  of  mental  vision. 

University  Extension  and  Traveling  Libraries 
These  two  movements  aim  chiefly  at  reaching 
the  adult  working  population.  The  avowed  pur- 
pose of  these  important  educational  activities  is 
to  bring  to  the  door  of  every  adult  an  opportunity 
i8  273 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

of  combining'  recreation  and  instruction.  The 
correspondence  school  and  farmers'  institute  are 
very  similar  in  their  essence  to  the  two  educational 
activities  now  under  consideration.  Professor 
Herbert  B.  Adams,  of  Johns  Hopkins  University, 
was  one  of  the  leading  spirits  in  preparing  the  way 
for  university  extension  work.  In  1890  the  Ameri- 
can Society  for  the  Extension  of  University  Teach- 
ing was  formed.  Two  years  later  that  pioneer  in 
many  lines  of  university  work — the  University  of 
Chicago — took  up  this  line  also.  University-exten- 
sion courses  were  instituted  in  many  cities  during 
the  early  nineties,  but  to-day  there  are  only  three 
large  centers, — Philadelphia,  New  York  and  Chi- 
cago. In  a  recent  college  year  the  University  of 
Chicago  gave  over  two  hundred  courses  at  about  one 
hundred  and  fifty  secondary  centers.  The  attendance 
was  estimated  at  about  43,000.  The  progress  of 
university  extension  has  not  been  as  encouraging  as 
its  original  promoters  anticipated,  but  it  has  per- 
formed an  important  service.  It  has  demonstrated 
the  possibility  of  reaching  the  adult.  The  free  lec- 
ture courses  of  some  of  the  larger  cities  are  probably 
due  in  a  large  measure  to  the  impulse  given  by  this 
movement.  If  this  extension  movement  has  done  no 
more  than  to  point  out  to  boards  of  education  the 
need  and  the  value  of  popular  lectures,  it  has  ac- 
complished much.  The  duty  of  teachers  and  of 
boards  of  education  is  not  wholly  performed  when 
an  effort  is  only  made  to  reach  those  whom  the  com- 
pulsory education  forces  into  the  schoolroom.  The 
274 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

school  should  go  out  into  the  highways  and  the 
byways  and  prepare  a  table  for  all  comers. 

Fundamentally,  the  traveling  library  and  uni- 
versity extension  have  one  and  the  same  aim.  The 
former  goes  to  the  small,  isolated  community  and 
the  little  crossroads;  it  reaches  the  people  whom 
the  university-extension  movement  cannot  hope  to 
touch ;  it  goes  where  the  permanent  free  public 
library  is  impossible  or  inadvisable.  "Fastnesses 
of  illiteracy  in  the  mountains  of  Kentucky,  Ten- 
nessee, Alabama  and  Georgia  are  being  stormed, 
with  a  rain  not  of  bullets,  but  of  books  and  pictures, 
and  while  the  proud  mountaineer  is  suspicious  and 
fearful  of  patronage  in  these  free  books,  yet  the 
boundless  joy  of  his  children  is  winning  him  to 
look  upon  the  traveling  library  with  favor."  The 
traveling  library  reaches  the  mountaineer  of  the 
South,  the  farmer  of  the  North,  and  the  miner  of 
the  West.  The  books  of  this  little  library  supple- 
ment and  enrich  the  work  of  the  rural  school. 
While  of  course  book  learning  is  only  a  small  part 
of  true  education,  the  use  of  the  book  will  do  much 
to  relieve  the  tediousness  and  monotony  of  life,  to 
give  nourishment  to  new  thoughts  and  higher 
ideals,  and  to  improve  the  efficiency  of  the  readers. 

To  the  island  continent  of  Australia  belongs  the 
honor  of  the  original  conception  and  utilization  of 
the  traveling-library  system.  The  public  library 
of  Adelaide,  Australia,  in  1859  sent  out  eight  such 
libraries  of  thirty  volumes  each.  To  Melvil  Dewey 
of  New  York  belongs  the  credit  of  starting  the 
movement  in  the  United  States.     In  1892  he  sent 

27S 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

out  from  the  State  Library  at  Albany  several 
libraries  of  one  hundred  volumes  each.  The  travel- 
ing libraries  have  been  defined  as  "small  collections, 
generally  fifty  in  number,  of  the  best  popular  books, 
fiction,  juvenile,  history,  biography,  science,  v^^hich 
are  sent  from  one  station  to  another,  at  intervals 
of  six  months."  Only  seven  years  after  the  begin- 
ning was  made  in  New  York  by  Mr.  Dewey,  "there 
were  2,500  traveling  libraries  in  the  United  States, 
containing  110,000  volumes,  which  were  read  by 
nearly  one  million  people."^  The  National  Federa- 
tion of  Women's  Clubs  and  the  farmers'  institutes 
of  many  states  have  taken  hold  of  this  work,  and  in 
states  where  no  appropriation  is  allowed  have  sent 
out  many  libraries.  During  the  seven  years  pre- 
ceding 1905  the  Illinois  Federation  of  Women's 
Clubs  created  and  sent  forth  on  their  journeys 
300  traveling  libraries.  More  than  a  score  of  states 
now  maintain  library-extension  boards.  The  next 
step  which  has  been  proposed  is  to  obtain  the  pas- 
sage of  a  law  which  will  permit  the  delivery  of  the 
books  through  the  rural  mail  delivery  at  a  very  low 
cost.  Such  a  scheme  is  well  worth  consideration 
and  seems  to  be  a  step  in  advance  in  the  attempt  to 
reach,  interest  and  encourage  the  adult. 

The  work  of  the  Wisconsin  Free  Library  Com- 
mission is  worthy  of  further  mention.  This  com- 
mission was  established  in  1895  and  from  the  first 
recognized  the  importance  of  the  traveling  library. 
In  addition  to  the  libraries  of  the  state  commission, 
several  counties  in  the  state  maintain  local  traveling 

^Chautauquan^  October,  1902. 
276 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

libraries,  and  the  State  Federation  of  Women's 
Clubs  has  aided  in  the  work.  In  August,  1900,  there 
were  238  traveling  libraries  in  this  state,  of  which 
number  54  were  controlled  by  the  state  commis- 
sion. In  1902  this  number  had  increased  to  305; 
and  in  January,  1905,  to  nearly  400.  German, 
Scandinavian,  municipal  government  and  study 
libraries  have  been  successfully  circulated.  In  at 
least  one  county.  Portage,  a  traveling  picture 
"library"  has  been  tried.  These  pictures  comprise 
"flowers,  landscapes,  marine  views,  game  and 
religious  subjects  in  photographic  and  brown  and 
colored  lithographic  reproductions."  Each  picture 
should  be  accompanied  by  a  short  account  of  the 
subject  and  the  author.  These  libraries  were  cir- 
culated through  the  medium  of  the  schools,  the 
teacher  being  asked  to  invite  the  pupils  and  their 
parents  to  the  school  for  an  occasional  evening  to 
enjoy  the  pictures.  Such  a  movement  will  aid  in 
brightening  the  walls  of  many  bare  and  somber 
schoolhouses.  In  the  schoolroom  art,  sunlight  and 
cleanliness  should  be  invoked  to  aid  the  teaching 
process ;  but,  alas,  how  often  these  efficient  aids  are 
neglected ! 

Transportation  of  Children  to  and  from 

School 
This  topic  may  be  considered  under  at  least  four 
different  aspects:  (i)  Township  consolidation  of 
rural  schools  and  transportation  of  children  by 
means  of  wagons ;  (2)  transportation  of  rural  chil- 
dren to  town  or  city  schools  by  means  of  the  steam 
277 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

or  electric  railroad;  (3)  transportation  of  city  chil- 
dren to  schools  situated  in  a  pleasant  suburban 
environment,  in  order  that  they  may  receive  the 
benefits  of  fresh  air,  large  playgrounds,  contact 
with  nature,  and  contact  with  agricultural  life; 
(4)  excursions  for  school  children  (a)  from  coun- 
try to  city,  and  (b)  from  city  to  country. 

The  consolidation  of  the  rural  schools  is  taking 
place  as  the  result  of  a  demand  on  the  part  of  the 
farming  population  for  better  rural  schools.  It  is 
an  attempt  to  introduce  the  graded-school  system 
and  to  bring  the  rural  school  up  to  the  standard  of 
the  city  schools.  Where  the  graded  system  can  be 
substituted  for  the  one-room,  ungraded  school  of 
the  small  district  better  teachers  and  better  appa- 
ratus may  be  provided,  although  it  leads  to  the  more 
rigid  system  which  large  classes  necessitates.  The 
consolidation  of  schools  seems  to  be  a  phase  of 
the  modern  tendency  towards  centralization  of 
authority  and  management.  A  Massachusetts  law 
of  1869  provided  that  the  school  committee  "may 
use"  funds  for  transporting  school  children  to  and 
from  school.  In  Connecticut  a  law  passed  in  1889 
provided  for  the  discontinuance  of  small  schools 
and  for  union  with  schools  in  adjoining  districts. 
In  1893  transportation  of  pupils  was  authorized. 
In  Ohio  a  special  law  of  1894  authorized  consolida- 
tion of  schools  and  transportation  of  pupils  in 
Kingsville  Township,  Ashtabula  County.  By  1903 
twenty-four  states  had  passed  laws  permitting  the 
consolidation  of  rural  schools  and  the  transportation 
of  pupils  at  public  expense.  The  usual  conveyance 
278 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

is  a  wagon  or  a  sled;  but  in  several  districts  the 
trolley  has  been  utilized.  During  the  winter  of 
1900-1901,  for  example,  a  trolley  car  was  run  at 
the  expense  of  the  town  of  Stamford,  Connecticut, 
to  convey  school  children  from  Shippan  Point  to 
one  of  the  town  schools. 

The  concensus  of  opinion  seems  to  be  that  the 
consolidation  of  schools  tends  to  improve  the 
schools  in  the  rural  districts,  since  it  is  possible  to 
employ  better  teachers  and  to  obtain  more  efficient 
and  effective  supervision.  In  Kingsville  some  of 
the  advantages  claimed  are  as  follows:  "The  line 
between  the  country-bred  and  the  village-bred  youth 
is  blotted  out" ;  higher  classes  may  be  taught ;  the 
attendance  is  larger  and  more  regular;  the  school 
year  has  been  lengthened  as  a  result  of  consolida- 
tion; "all  parts  of  the  township  have  been  brought 
into  closer  touch  and  sympathy";  and  "the  cost  of 
maintenance  is  less  than  that  of  the  schools  under 
the  subdistrict  plan."^ 

In  New  Zealand  the  railroads  are  utilized  to  bring 
the  children  from  the  rural  districts  to  the  city 
schools,  thus  enabliiig  many  country  children  to 
attend  the  well-equipped  city  schools.  Three 
months'  season  tickets  are  sold  on  the  state  rail- 
roads to  school  children  for  from  two  dollars  and 
fifty  cents  to  five  dollars,  according  to  the  age  of 
the  pupils.  Pupils  in  the  primary  grades  are  car- 
ried free.  These  tickets  are  sold  to  all  places  within 
a  radius  of  sixty  miles  of  the  school.    "This  gives 

^  See  Arena,  July,  1899 ;  also  Reports  of  Commissioner  of 
Education. 

279 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

them  a  possible  one  hundred  and  twenty  miles  a 
day  for  three  to  six  cents,  in  round  numbers,  or 
twenty  to  forty  miles  for  a  cent.  If  a  child  goes 
in  and  out  six  miles  each  day,  he  rides  twelve  miles 
for  three  cents."^ 

The  possibility  of  utilizing  our  city  and  suburban 
electric  roads  for  the  transportation  of  city  children 
to  well-located  suburban  schools  is  worthy  of 
careful  consideration  by  our  city  school  authorities. 
The  environment  of  many  of  our  city  schools  con- 
stitutes one  bad  feature  which,  in  many  cases,  can 
be  adequately  remedied  only  by  removing  the  school 
itself.  The  children  could  gather  at  some  one,  or 
at  several,  sheltered  points,  or  a  sufficient  number 
of  cars  could  be  run  on  to  a  siding  at  some  con- 
venient point  or  points,  and  the  children  could  be 
conveyed  to  the  school  in  cars  chartered  for  this 
purpose.  In  the  case  of  vacation  schools,  this  mat- 
ter is  of  even  greater  importance  than  in  the  case 
of  the  regular  schools.  Many  of  our  city  schools 
have  small  or  no  playgrounds,  and  are  surrounded 
by  brick  walls  and  stony  pavements.  The  constant 
hum  and  clamor  of  the  street  sounds  unceasingly 
in  the  ears  of  the  child.  Saloons,  billboards,  dirt, 
smoke  and  ashes  are  familiar  elements  in  the  envi- 
ronment. Trees  and  grass  are  conspicuous  chiefly 
by  their  absence.  On  the  other  hand,  if  the  school 
is  located  in  a  rural  or  suburban  environment,  it 
could  be  placed  in  the  center  of  a  large  field. 
Trees,  shrubs,  flowers  and  grass  could  now  occupy 
prominent  places  in  the  environment  of  the  school. 

*  Parsons,  The  Story  of  New  Zealand,  p.  386. 
280 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

Tennis  courts,  hand-ball  courts,  fields  for  baseball 
and  basketball,  playgrounds  and  gardens  could  be 
provided  for  the  students.  In  fact,  several  school 
buildings  might  well  be .  grouped  together  in  one 
large  field,  and  be  provided  with  a  central  heating 
and  lighting  plant.  A  noon  meal  would,  of  course, 
be  provided  for  the  students.  Manual-training 
shops,  domestic-science  laboratories,  gymnasiums, 
swimming  pools  and  the  like  could  be  utilized  by  all 
classes  in  the  different  schools  of  the  group. 

The  value  of  land  in  the  suburbs  is,  of  course, 
much  less  than  that  located  in  the  more  central 
portions  of  the  city.  The  saving  of  interest  on  the 
additional  issue  of  bonds  necessary  to  purchase  a 
new,  or  to  enlarge  an  old,  central  location  over  that 
required  to  purchase  land  in  the  suburbs  would 
practically  pay  for  the  expense  of  transportation, 
which  should  be  at  cost  to  the  company.  If  the 
view  that  the  school  of  the  future  will  exercise 
supervision  over  the  child  from  early  morning  until 
late  in  the  afternoon  is  accepted,  this  plan  appears 
to  offer  a  rational  and  happy  solution  of  the  prob- 
lem, at  least  in  the  case,  of  schools  now  located  in 
the  crowded  and  undesirable  sections  of  our  cities. 

Excursions  are  now  usually  a  part  of  the  pro- 
gram of  a  well-organized  vacation  school ;  but  New 
Zealand  seems  to  make  much  greater  use  of  this 
educational  feature.  Excursions  are  frequently 
arranged  in  that  island  for  the  country  children  as 
well  as  for  those  confined  to  the  city.  A  flat  rate 
of  four  miles  for  one  cent  is  given  by  the  railroads 
to  the  school  excursionists.  "By  these  excursions 
281 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

the  country  children  come  to  town,  where  they  are 
received  by  school  committees  who  conduct  them 
over  museums,  newspaper  offices,  gas  works,  ocean 
steamers,  etc.,  and  explain  everything.  A  thousand 
city  children  see  fields  of  waving  yellow  wheat 
reaped  and  bound ;  see  orchards,  forests,  mountains, 
lakes  and  glaciers;  view  dairy  farms  and  cream- 
eries; and  learn  about  the  country  and  the  life  of 
the  country  people."^  It  is  needless  to  dwell  upon 
the  educational  value  of  such  sightseeing  for  both 
the  rural  and  the  urban  child.  If  the  children  of 
New  Zealand — a  country  possessing  no  large, 
crowded  cities  with  the  consequent  wide  separation 
of  rural  and  urban  life — are  benefited  by  such 
excursions,  surely  the  value  to  American  children 
is  not  small. 

Medical  Inspection  in  Schools 
The  duties  of  medical  inspectors  for  the  public 
schools  are  well  stated  as  follows:  "(i)  The 
supervision  of  the  sanitary  condition  of  school 
buildings  and  their  appointments;  (2)  the  super- 
vision of  the  carrying  out  of  the  regulations  con- 
cerning the  hygiene  of  instruction  and  appliances ; 
(3)  the  care  of  the  health  of  public-school  children 
and  aiding  the  public  physicians  in  preventing  and 
combating  contagious  diseases,  determining  the 
physical  defects  of  children  for  the  purpose  of  con- 
tinuous observation  or  special  consideration  during 
school  hours,  and  the  supervision  of  the  physical 
training  in  so  far  as  it  is  directed  in  school."     This 

*  Parsons,  p.  387. 

282 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

is  the  ideal  form  of  inspection.  Medical  inspection 
is  employed  in  the  schools  of  cities  in  Sweden, 
Austria,  France,  Egypt,  Belgium,  Holland  and 
Germany;  in  the  United  States  several  cities  have 
introduced  such  a  system — Boston  in  1890,  Phila- 
delphia in  1892,  Chicago  in  1896,  and  New  York 
in  1897. 

Medical  inspection  is  in  actual  practice  usually 
confined  to  examination  of  children  in  order  to  pre- 
vent the  spread  of  communicable  diseases.  In  the 
schools  of  New  York  City  both  medical  inspectors 
and  nurses  are  employed.  The  inspectors  examine 
eyes,  throats  and  skin  of  children ;  the  nurses  give 
aid  and  advice  in  the  treatment  of  simple  ailments, 
treat  certain  cases,  such  as  eruptions  on  the  skin  or 
the  presence  of  vermin.  Thorough  inspection  and 
treatment  of  this  sort  is  one  of  the  best  possible 
preventives  of  the  spread  of  communicable  diseases. 
In  our  crowded  cities  the  necessity  of  such  treat- 
ment is  almost  self-evident  to  the  thoughtful 
individual. 

Consideration  should,  however,  be  given  to  the 
first  and  second  clauses  in  the  list  of  duties  as  out- 
lined above.  This  is  a  much  neglected  field.  The 
school  itself  through  its  buildings,  equipment  and 
methods  is  a  fruitful  source  of  disease  among  chil- 
dren. "As  far  as  schools  are  concerned,  the  causes 
among  school  children  are  to  be  found  mainly  in 
the  long  deprivation  of  freedom,  the  restricted 
benefit  of  pure,  fresh  air,  the  unaccustomed  quiet 
position  in  sitting,  the  confined  activity  of  the 
muscles,  and  the  premature  and  often  protracted 
283 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

mental  effort."  These  conditions  are  all  removable 
and  will  be  removed  as  progress  is  made  toward  a 
more  natural  and  saner  method  of  developing  the 
mental  and  physical  capabilities  of  the  young. 
Good  ventilation,  proper  lighting,  comfortable 
desks,  sufficient  exercise  and  change  of  occupation 
are  proper  subjects  for  the  advice  of  physicians. 
The  kindergarten,  manual  training,  physical  train- 
ing, nature  study,  vacation  schools,  and  many  other 
recent  educational  innovations  are  signs  of  progress. 
The  vital,  positive  work  of  medical  inspection  in 
the  schools  should  be  the  removal  of  all  those  fea- 
tures of  school  work  and  apparatus  which  tend  to 
reduce  the  physical  and  mental  vigor  of  the  student, 
or  to  induce  weaknesses  which  may  offer  a  foot- 
hold for  disease.  Ignorance  on  our  part  or  on  the 
part  of  others  with  whom  we  are  forced  into  con- 
tact is  a  fruitful  source  of  disease.  It  would  be 
difficult  to  measure  or  even  to  roughly  estimate  the 
economic  and  social  value  of  the  work  of  con- 
scientious medical  experts  who  can  act  in  conjunc- 
tion with  the  teacher  and  board  of  education  for 
the  prevention  of  disease  and  weakness,  and  for  the 
removal  of  the  conditions  which  are  fruitful  causes 
of  these  evils.  Prevention,  rather  than  cure,  is, 
of  course,  the  ideal.  Medical  science  has  not 
developed  its  preventive  side  as  well  as  it  might 
because  the  economic  motive  for  so  doing  is  lack- 
ing. This  is  not  a  wholesale  indictment  of  the 
medical  fraternity;  this  condition  is  merely  due 
to  the  frailties  of  human  nature,  and  the  same 
phenomenon  appears  in  all  persons  and  in  other 
284 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

professions.  The  permanent  employment  of  physi- 
cians at  reasonable  salaries  would  place  physicians 
in  such  a  position  that  economic  motives  would  lead 
them  to  make  a  careful  study  of  the  prevention  of 
disease.  Then  the  work  of  such  men  in  the  school 
would  soon  lead  them  to  the  home,  and  to  the 
betterment  of  home  conditions. 

Dullness,  stupidity,  ill-behavior  are  often  due  to 
poor  sight,  poor  hearing,  bad  ventilation  or 
improper  nourishment.  Medical  inspection  should 
discover  these  defects  and  prescribe  the  proper 
treatment  of  the  child  for  his  physical  welfare ;  and 
the  teacher  or  principal,  by  means  of  the  informa- 
tion furnished,  will  be  able  to  better  work  out  the 
proper  line  of  treatment  for  his  educational  develop- 
ment. The  transmission  of  this  information  to  the 
parent  ought  to  aid  in  obtaining  a  more  rational 
and  sympathetic  treatment  of  the  child  by  his 
parents  and  associates. 

Two  fundamental  and  unanswerable  arguments 
may  be  made  in  favor  of  medical  inspection  and 
care  for  the  children  in  our  public  schools.  It  is 
an  essential  safeguard  against  the  spread  of  con- 
tagious and  infectious  diseases,  and  it  is  a  means 
of  raising  the  national  standard  of  mental  and 
manual  efficiency  and  skill.  On  the  other  hand,  if 
the  state  as  the  result  of  economic  necessity  and  by 
means  of  legal  regulations  makes  school  attendance 
compulsory,  it  ought  to  replace  the  parental  care  and 
watchfulness  by  the  skilled  attention  of  competent 
medical  practitioners.  Compulsory  school  attend- 
ance forces  the  child  into  contact  with  many  other 
285 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

children  from  a  multitude  of  homes,  and  at  the 
same  time  it  removes  the  child  from  the  eye  of 
the  parent.  Safeguarding  the  health  of  the  chil- 
dren is  a  correlative  of  a  compulsory  school  law. 
Duty  to  society  and  to  parents  demands  medical 
inspection,  the  school  physician  and  the  school 
nurse. 

The  School  Nursery 
In  the  homes  where  the  mother  is  obliged  to  go 
outside  to  work,  the  child  is  necessarily  left  to  the 
tender  mercies  of  the  older  brothers  and  sisters. 
Lacking  proper  opportunities  for  play  in  the  home, 
the  street  becomes  the  natural  playground  for  the 
very  young  child  as  well  as  for  the  older  ones. 
The  nursery  becomes  as  essential  in  connection  with 
the  school  as  is  the  playground  or  the  kindergarten. 
This  increasing  supervision  and  control  of  the 
young  by  the  school  may  not  give  ideal  results,  it 
may  not  be  as  beneficial  to  the  child  as  the  average 
home  training  of  the  past  may  have  been,  but  the 
facts  of  the  case  must  be  considered.  The  home  of 
the  past  of  which  we  think  when  this  question  is 
raised,  sheltered  the  mother  all  day.  "Where 
mother  is,  that  is  home."  If  the  mother  is  not 
there,  if  the  playground  has  vanished,  if  fresh  air 
and  open  spaces  are  negligible  quantities,  if  there 
is  no  daily  round  of  chores,  what  is  there  left  of 
this  traditional  home  that  is  more  sacred  than  the 
public  school,  the  public  kindergarten,  or  the  public 
nursery?  The  truth  is  that  many  city  homes  no 
longer  afford  opportunity  for  the  proper  care  and 
2m 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

treatment  of  the  growing  child.  The  school  must 
care  for  them  or  they  will  go  uncared  for.  It  must 
take  them  from  the  cradle  and  minister  unto  them 
until  they  are  men  and  women.  Until  the  school 
teachers,  the  school  authorities  and  the  general 
public  actually  recognize  the  breadth  of  the  mission 
of  the  public  school,  many,  many  innocent  and  help- 
less children  will  be  doomed  to  walk  the  downward 
path  which  leads  to  failure,  inefficiency,  ill-health 
and  crime. 

The  evolution  of  the  city  home  and  of  the  city 
itself  has  been  worked  out  as  the  result  of  purely 
temporary  individual  economic  motives — the  lure 
of  large  and  immediate  profits  has  fashioned  the 
situation.  The  child,  broader  social  aims,  and  the 
happiness  of  society  have  been  overlooked  because 
the  ideals  and  ethics  of  the  frontier  were  carried 
unmodified  into  our  city  civilization.  To  the  school 
now  comes  the  problem  of  partially,  at  least,  pre- 
paring a  place  for  the  child,  of  protecting  him,  in 
the  name  of  social  welfare  and  of  national  progress, 
from  the  insidious  encroachments  of  private  eco- 
nomic interests.  "If  the  school  were  to  assume  a 
larger  responsibility  for  the  child,  it  would  find  it 
necessary  to  begin  with  nurseries  to  care  for  the 
smaller  children  whose  parents  must  go  to  work."* 
It  must  go  further;  it  must  provide  a  place  and 
suitable  recreation  or  occupation  for  children  of  all 
ages  while  parents  are  at  work. 

The  schools  of  the  city  of  Paris  furnish  a  con- 
crete example  of  work  of  this  character.     There  is 

*  Htinter,  Poverty,  p.  206. 

287 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

a  system  of  so-called  "maternal  schools"  which  are 
free  to  all  small  children.  These  schools  are,  in 
reality,  kindergartens.  "To  bridge  the  some- 
what abrupt  transition  from  the  tender  and  indul- 
gent methods  of  the  mistresses  of  the  ecoles 
maternelles  [maternal  schools]  to  the  more  formal 
and  rigid  system  which  prevails  in  the  regular 
primary  schools,  it  has  been  found  well  to  establish 
a  system  of  so-called  enfantile  schools  for  children 
between  six  and  eight.  These  are  for  the  more 
timid,  sensitive,  or  backward."^  More  rational 
methods  in  the  regular  primary  schools  ought  to 
remove  this  "abrupt  transition."  An  extension  of 
some  of  the  methods  of  the  kindergarten  into  the 
primary  grades  is  undoubtedly  desirable.  But 
Paris  has  introduced  another  innovation  which, 
Dr.  Shaw  states,  has  been  successful.  "This  is  the 
system  of  garderies,  or  classes  de  garde,  for  small 
children  whose  parents  are  employed  away  from 
home  during  the  day.  In  many  cases — ^the  instances 
were  numbered  by  the  thousand — young  pupils 
were  released  at  four,  while  their  parents  could  not 
return  from  their  work  for  two  hours  or  more. 
Such  children  are  now  kept  in  custody  by  some  one 
connected  with  their  school,  are  allowed  to  play 
under  safe  conditions,  and  are  sent  home  at  the 
proper  hour."  Certainly,  this  is  a  simple,  sane 
solution  of  one  of  the  problems  facing  those 
responsible  for  the  youth  of  our  cities. 

*  Shaw,    Municipal    Government    in    Continental    Europe, 
p.  119. 

288 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

Feeding  School  Children 
By  the  following  statement  Robert  Hunter,  in 
his  well-known  book  entitled  Poverty,  startled 
many  complacent  Americans  who  have  supposed 
that  real  poverty  was  almost  unknown  in  this 
republic.  "There  must  be  thousands — very  likely 
sixty  or  seventy  thousand  children — in  New  York 
City  alone  who  often  arrive  at  school  hungry  and 
unfitted  to  do  well  the  work  required."  Superin- 
tendent Maxwell  also  says,  "What  a  farce  it  is  to 
talk  of  the  schools  providing  equal  opportunities 
for  all  when  there  are  thousands  of  children  in  our 
city  schools  who  cannot  learn  because  they  are 
always  hungry."  And  the  pertinent  question  arises 
in  the  minds  of  many :  Why  compel  children  to 
come  to  school  and  go  through  the  motions  of 
studying  and  learning  when  in  reality  they  are,  in 
many  cases,  physically  incapacitated?  If  many  in 
our  city  schools  are  not  properly  fed,  if  many  can- 
not do  efficient  work  because  of  lack  of  food,  logic 
as  well  as  humanitarian  ideals  ought  to  make  clear 
the  necessity  of  backing  up  our  compulsory  educa- 
tion law  by  the  school  dining  room.  Paternalism? 
The  cry  of  paternalism, — ^the  diminution  of  indi- 
vidual responsibility — is,  of  course,  heard  in  the  land 
every  time  society  assumes  functions  formerly  per- 
formed by  the  family  or  by  the  individual.  Cer- 
tainly this  is  paternalism,  but  of  a  kind  which 
modern  complex  conditions  make  a  necessity.  It 
is  urged  against  feeding  school  children,  as  it  is 
against  free  medical  attendance  and  advice,  that  it 
tends  towards  pauperization  and  irresponsibility; 
19  289 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

but  if  it  aids  in  building  up  healthy  bodies  and  active 
minds  it  acts  as  a  preventitive  of  the  pauperization 
of  the  next  generation.  In  the  period  1820- 1850 
it  was  urged  by  many  opponents  of  the  free  school 
system  that  free  public  education  would  pauperize 
both  the  children  and  their  parents,  John  Ran- 
dolph, in  his  speech  before  the  Virginia  Convention 
in  1829,  emphasized  this  view.  Nevertheless, 
to-day  we  have  free  schools,  free  text-books,  free 
public  libraries,  free  public  museums  and  art  gal- 
leries, and  so  on  through  a  long  list.  Is  there  any 
logical  reason  why  we  should  arbitrarily  draw  the 
line  at  free  meals  for  school  children?  Evils  are 
doubtless  connected  with  such  projects,  but  the 
scheme  should  be  tried  if  the  resultant  evils  are 
likely  to  be  less  than  those  now  existing.  The 
presence  of  marked  class  distinctions,  of  enormous 
differences  in  the  economic  strength  and  position 
of  different  individuals,  makes  governmental  pater- 
nalism a  modern  necessity. 

In  many  European  cities  the  plan  of  feeding 
school  children  at  noon  is  no  longer  a  novelty.  In 
the  United  States,  in  at  least  three  cities — New 
York,  Chicago  and  Milwaukee — private  philan- 
throphy  has  made  a  beginning ;  but  over  half  a  cen- 
tury ago,  Horace  Greeley,  in  the  New  York  Tribune 
and  elsewhere,  pointed  out  the  necessity  of  provid- 
ing for  hungry  school  children.  Many  children 
come  from  homes  where  the  mother  is  obliged  to 
work,  from  homes  where  there  is  no  playground 
except  the  street  or  alley,  from  homes  which  are 
small,  unsanitary  and  uninviting.  The  school  of 
?90 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

the  future  must  be  prepared  to  take  care  of  such 
children,  and  of  all  others  who  may  desire  to  be 
cared  for,  from  early  morning  until  late  in  the 
afternoon.  A  noon  meal  should  be  served, — a  meal 
which  is  simple,  nutritious,  well  cooked  and  daintily 
served.  A  morning  lunch  ought,  of  course,  to  be 
served  to  those  who  are  actually  sent  to  school 
hungry.  This  is  not  considered  a  charity;  it  is  on 
the  same  plane  as  free  text-books.  The  cooking 
department  might  be  utilized  to  provide  meals  for 
the  pupils. 

The  School  as  an  Employment  Agency 
The  problem  of  the  near  future  is  to  be  not  so 
much  that  of  the  direct  means  of  increasing  pro- 
duction, but  rather  of  the  proper  distribution  of 
men  in  different  occupations.  One  of  the  great 
wastes  of  modern  times  is  forced  unemployment 
in  certain  localities  and  industries,  and  the  dearth 
of  men  in  other  places  and  occupations.  Only 
improper  operation  or  functioning  of  the  industrial 
and  economic  machinery  of  society  as  a  whole 
causes  the  presence  of  great  floating  populations  of 
unemployed,  although  such  populations  seem  neces- 
sarily to  accompany  modern  industrial  operations. 
The  adjustment  of  work  to  workers,  the  decrease 
of  industrial  friction,  is  a  crying  necessity  of  the 
twentieth  century.  How  can  it  be  done?  This 
is  the  vital  problem  of  economics,  of  sociology  and 
of  education. 

In  recent  years  much  has  been  written  and  said 
about  the  right  of  every  man  to  a  job.     It  has  been 
291 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

held  by  some  writers  that  each  individual  has  a 
moral,  or  a  natural,  right  to  an  opportunity  to  sup- 
port himself  and  his  family  in  a  decent  and  respect- 
able manner.  From  the  social  point  of  view  such  a 
contention  is  right,  and  should  be  encouraged.  If, 
however,  society  is  to  guarantee  such  a  right,  if  it 
is  to  agree  to  provide  occupation  for  all  its  able- 
bodied  members,  it  surely  must,  through  public 
education,  be  prepared  to  train  the  individual  to 
perform  useful  work  efficiently,  and  it  must  find  a 
place  for  those  individuals  after  they  are  so  trained. 
Modern  conditions  are,  in  fact,  forcing  upon  society 
this  question  of  the  right  of  the  laborer  to  a  job. 
Land  and  opportunity  have  fallen  into  the  hands  of 
certain  individuals.  Society  is  obliged  for  its  own 
development  and  welfare  to  take  care  of  those 
individuals  toward  whom  opportunity  has  appar- 
ently turned  her  back.  Indeed,  the  state  may 
eventually  find  it  necessary  to  enter  the  industrial 
field  as  a  competitor  of  the  individual  employer  or 
the  private  corporation.  Under  a  simple  economy 
demand  was  always  accompanied,  under  normal 
and  healthy  conditions,  by  the  opportunity  to  obtain 
satisfaction.  Our  present  intricate  system  has  taken 
this  privilege  or  right  away  from  the  majority  of 
men.  Nearly  every  one  must  obtain  work  through 
some  employer  of  labor.  The  opportunity  to  work 
depends  in  the  last  analysis  upon  the  decision 
of  an  individual  other  than  the  worker  himself. 
The  establishment  of  a  legal  right  to  work  would 
be  the  best  possible  approach  to  natural  conditions ; 
292 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

but,  as  was  intimated  above,  it  involves  the  entrance 
of  the  state  into  the  industrial  field. 

Without  going  so  far  as  to  guarantee  every  per- 
son a  job,  the  school  might  be  used  as  an  employ- 
ment agency,  and  thus  aid  in  mitigating  some  of 
the  evils  of  unemployment  and  in  placing  the  right 
person  in  the  right  place.  In  the  case  of  the  able- 
bodied  person  who  is  willing  to  work,  unemploy- 
ment is  of  several  kinds,  for  example,  seasonal,  due 
to  industrial  depressions,  local  and  individual.  The 
first  is  not,  perhaps,  properly  a  form  of  unemploy- 
ment. The  possibility  of  dovetailing  seasonal 
industries  together,  and  the  possibility  of  giving 
trade  instruction  with  this  end  in  view,  have  already 
been  discussed.  In  the  case  of  widespread  depres- 
sions and  of  unemployment  extending  over  large 
sections  of  the  country,  the  only  remedy  lies  in  the 
considerable  increase  of  public  work  of  various 
kinds.  In  the  case  of  a  local  surplus  of  workers, 
employment  bureaus  might  be  established  to  assist 
workers  in  finding  work  in  other  localities,  and 
thus  to  equalize  supply  and  demand  for  labor. 

At  all  times,  however,  some  are  out  of  employ- 
ment, and  young  persons  are  constantly  seeking 
entrance  into  the  business  world  for  the  first  time. 
To  give  assistance  to  such  persons  is  the  real  func- 
tion of  the  school  employment  agency.  Young 
men  who  are  out  of  work  and  who  have  learned  no 
trade,  or  who  are  not  well  prepared  for  any  occu- 
pation, could  be  placed  in  the  continuation  school 
during  the  period  of  waiting.  They  could  be  taught 
the  trade  for  which  there  is  the  greatest  demand, 
293 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

provided  they  are  qualified  to  learn  such  a  trade. 
Older  men  might  be  made  more  skilful  in  their 
chosen  trade  or  calling.  The  domestic-science 
department  might  also  contribute  its  mite  to  the 
solution  of  the  ever-present  servant  problem ;  but 
in  order  to  accomplish  much  in  this  direction,  train- 
ing of  the  employers  would  probably  be  also 
required. 

Work  in  the  school  shops,  In  school  yards  or  in 
municipal  plants  of  various  kinds  might  be  supplied 
to  a  limited  number  of  persons  which  would  keep 
them  from  actual  want  or  from  the  necessity  of 
applying  for  charity.  Furthermore,  while  they 
were  thus  earning  a  bare  living  and  waiting  to  be 
placed,  much  valuable  training  in  their  trade,  or  in 
some  skilled  or  unskilled  occupation  could  be  given. 
In  order  to  take  up  the  work  of  finding  employment 
in  the  manner  just  outlined,  continuation  schools, 
commercial  schools,  shops  and  domestic-science 
laboratories  are  essential.  It  is,  however,  feasible 
for  manual-training  schools,  commercial  high 
schools  and  night  schools,  as  at  present  organized,, 
to  give  assistance  to  many  of  their  students. 

Paying  Children  to  go  to  School 
Since  true  social  reform  begins  with  the  incom- 
ing generation,  with  the  plastic  minds  of  the  chil- 
dren of  to-day,  the  key  to  the  solution  of  many 
problems  which  confront  modern  society  will  be 
found  in  measures  which  vitally  affect  the  training 
and  environment  of  the  young.  For  this  reason 
the  most  paternalistic,  radical  and  startling  of  all 
294 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

the  new  projects  in  education  cannot  be  laughed  out 
of  court.  It  is  soberly  presented  for  careful  con- 
sideration as  a  proposed  piece  of  scientific  legisla- 
tion. The  chief  benefits  which  may  be  anticipated 
from  the  establishment  of  some  system  of  paying 
children  to  go  to  school  are  three  in  number:  unde- 
sirable child  labor  would  be  prevented  or  greatly, 
reduced ;  the  mass  of  children  would  remain  longer 
in  school ;  and  the  amount  of  "race  suicide"  among 
the  middle  class  would  be  reduced.  i 

Paying  children  to  go  to  school  is  in  harmony 
with  long  established  national,  state  and  local 
policies.  Bounties  have  been  granted  to  producers, 
ships  have  been  liberally  subsidized,  protective 
tariffs  have  been  placed  on  our  statute  books,  vast, 
sums  of  money  have  been  voted  for  internal 
improvements,  money  has  been  furnished  for  irri- 
gation, for  agricultural  experiment  stations,  for 
schools  and  universities,  for  free  text-books,  for 
charities  and  corrections,  and  so  on  through  a  long 
list.  These  steps  have  been  taken  ostensibly  for 
the  betterment  of  society,  for  the  advancement  of 
the  interests  of  all  the  citizens  of  the  United  States. 
It  is  proposed  to  subsidize  the  youth  of  the  country 
in  order  to  produce  better  men  and  women,  to 
reduce  the  amount  of  physical  and  mental  weak- 
ness, to  raise  the  standard  of  morality  and  of  citi- 
zenship,— in  short,  to  increase  the  most  important 
form  of  wealth  which  it  is  possible  for  a  nation  to 
possess.  The  state  as  well  as  the  family  is  vitally 
interested ;  the  state  should  share  the  burden.  The 
children  of  this  country  are  now  provided  with  an 
295 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

expensive  school  system ;  but  if  a  large  percentage 
of  the  children  cannot  or  do  not  remain  in  attend- 
ance long  enough  to  derive  the  real  benefits  of  a 
common-school  education,  the  economic  and  social 
waste  is  enormous. 

One  of  the  most  serious  of  our  industrial  evils 
is  that  of  child  labor  in  mines,  factories,  sweat 
shops,  and  on  the  street.  In  the  majority  of  cases 
where  children  leave  school  at  an  early  age  to 
become  wage-earners,  it  is  because  of  the  cupidity 
or  necessities  of  the  parents,  the  desire  of  the  child 
to  earn  money,  or  the  character  of  the  available 
school  training.  When  school  attendance  becomes 
a  direct  means  of  earning  money,  a  positive  check 
is  provided  against  the  operation  of  the  first  two 
causes.  In  order  to  make  education  the  great  lever 
by  means  of  which  the  level  of  society  may  be 
raised,  it  is  necessary  not  only  that  the  school  sys- 
tem enlarge  its  functions  but  also  that  it  keep  the 
children  in  school  an  increasingly  long  period  of 
years.  Determined  efforts  have  been  made  to 
stamp  out  the  evil  of  child  labor  by  means  of 
repressive  legislation ;  coercion  has  been  used  to 
force  education  upon  all  children,  willing  or  unwill- 
ing. The  measure  now  under  consideration  leads, 
instead  of  pushing,  the  parent  and  the  child  along 
the  desired  road.  Repressive  and  coercive  legisla- 
tion in  regard  to  child  labor  and  education  will  no 
doubt  be  necessary  after  this  scheme  is  put  into 
operation,  but  the  probability  of  its  success  is  mul- 
tiplied many  times.  The  line  of  least  social  resist- 
ance is  chosen.  The  temptation  to  increase  the 
296 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

family  income  through  the  work  of  the  child  is  in  a 
large  measure  removed.  By  means  of  this  simple 
device  the  self-interest  of  the  individual  is  made 
to  further  human  progress.  Coercive  measures 
are  always  inefficient  and  difficult  to  enforce.  When 
the  personal  interests  of  the  individuals  directly 
concerned  are  visibly  aided  by  the  proposed  meas- 
ures coercion  is  unnecessary,  and  the  desired  results 
are  obtained  with  a  minimum  expenditure  of  social 
energy.  It  is  the  acme  of  scientific  legislation  to 
direct  selfish  forces  so  as  to  bring  about  social  wel- 
fare, so  as  to  make  it  easy  to  do  right. 

Children  are  necessary  to  race  preservation,  yet 
under  present  conditions  children,  viewed  solely 
from  the  economic  view,  are  a  burden.  The  antith- 
esis is  presented :  individual  preservation  on  the 
accustomed  standard  of  living,  or  race  preservation ; 
individual  advantages  versus  social  claims.  The 
path  out  of  the  dilemma  leads  onward,  not  back- 
ward. Free  schools,  free  text-books,  public  play- 
grounds are  some  of  the  mileposts  on  the  road 
which  leads  to  payment  for  school  attendance. 
These  are  forms  of  state  aid  to  parents,  and  have 
been  ostensibly  introduced  in  the  name  of  the  state, 
of  society,  of  the  public  welfare.  The  instinct  of 
race  preservation,  in  contradistinction  to  the  sexual 
instinct,  is  not  strong  in  the  individual;  only  to 
organized  society  does  the  broader  aspect  appeal. 
Industrial  and  social  forces  are  to-day  making  for 
the  small  family.  Society  cannot  turn  backwards 
to  the  industrial  conditions  of  a  few  generations 
ago;  but  it  can,  through  legislative  measures,' 
297 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

weaken  the  forces  which  are  now  causing  late  mar- 
riages and  opposing  the  desire  for  offspring.  When 
this  is  done  race  preservation  will  take  care  of  itself. 
The  policy  of  paying  children  to  go  to  school  will 
tend  to  reduce  the  amount  of  child  labor  among  the 
poorer  classes  of  the  community,  and  will,  as  a  con- 
sequence, diminish  the  number  of  the  future 
inefficient  workers  and  of  physical  and  mental 
weaklings.  It  will  also  act  so  as  to  raise  the  birth 
rate  of  the  families  in  the  so-called  middle  class, 
thus  increasing  a  very  desirable  element  in  our 
population.  The  financial  obstacles  seem  at  present 
to  offer  almost  insuperable  barriers.  Students  of 
taxation  are  however  pointing  out  new  and  impor- 
tant sources  of  revenue ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
adoption  of  this  scheme  would  tend  to  reduce  the 
nation's  bill  for  drink,  crime,  ill-health  and  charity. 
This  innovation  is  the  logical  consequence  of  a 
policy  which  provides  free  tuition,  free  text-books, 
free  playgrounds  and  free  medical  aid  in  schools. 

What  are  all  these  innovations  leading  us  toward  ? 
is  a  question  which  will  rise  to  the  lips  of  many 
readers.  According  to  Lieber,  "the  duty  of  the 
state  is  to  do  for  man,  first,  what  he  cannot  do 
alone;  second,  what  he  ought  not  to  do  alone; 
third,  what  he  will  not  do  alone."  Modern  life 
makes  imperative  greater  collective  action  and  in- 
creases the  duties  and  responsibilities  of  the  state. 
Greater  relative  and  absolute  portions  of  the  national 
income  must  be  devoted  to  collective  betterment 
and  enjoyment.  The  school  is  one  of  the  chief 
298 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

instruments  by  means  of  which  the  duty  of  the 
state  in  modern  industrial  society  is  discharged. 
Not  the  destruction,  but  the  conservation,  of  indi- 
vidual development  and  welfare  is  the  aim.  Every 
enlargement  and  enrichment  of  the  curriculum,  and 
every  step  toward  increasing  the  economic,  social 
or  industrial  functions  of  our  public-school  system 
have  met  with  bitter  opposition.  Many  of  the 
projects  just  discussed  have  been  or  are  now 
being  branded  as  radical  and  socialistic.  This  is  a 
natural  and  inevitable  phenomenon ;  every  new  and 
important  measure  has  been  and  will  be  thus 
branded.  Every  man  who  has  striven  to  better 
the  mass  of  common  humanity  and  to  strike  at  the 
roots  of  established  inequalities  or  interests,  has 
invariably  been  tagged  an  anarchist,  a  leveler,  a 
socialist,  or  an  unsafe  person.  But  history  calmly 
points  out  that  many  of  the  radicals  and  socialists 
of  one  age  become  the  liberals  and  conservatives  of 
another. 

In  the  third  decade  of  last  century,  the  man  who 
urged  manhood  suffrage,  the  abolition  of  imprison- 
ment for  debt,  or  free  public  schools  was  a  radical. 
In  1819  a  famous  Cologne  newspaper  opposed  with 
great  earnestness  a  project  to  illuminate  the  streets 
of  that  city.  It  took  a  firm  stand  against  this 
innovation  because  of  theological,  legal,  medical, 
moral,  economic  and  patriotic  reasons.  Street 
lighting  was  on  all  of  these  counts  a  menace  to  the 
welfare,  happiness  and  advancement  of  the  com- 
munity. The  individuals  possessed  of  the  hardi- 
hood to  favor  such  a  project  were,  in  the  eyes  of 
299 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

this  writer,  unsafe  persons.  The  editor  himself 
was  of  course  safe  and  sane ;  he  "stood  pat"  for  the 
status  quo.  In  1776  such  illustrious  gentlemen  as 
George  Washington  and  John  Adams  were  revo- 
lutionists. Twenty  years  ago  the  writer  or  speaker 
who  urged  governmental  control  or  ownership  of 
railways  was  looked  upon  with  suspicion  in  many, 
if  not  all,  sections  of  this  country.  Before  1898 
no  radical  dreamed  of  extending  the  sway  of  the 
United  States  over  the  people  of  the  Philippine 
Islands ;  but  the  latter  are  now  a  part  of  our 
colonial  possessions. 

Those  who  align  themselves  in  opposition  to  the 
educational  innovations  of  the  present  epoch  often 
paraphrase  men  of  an  earlier  generation  who  were 
opposing  certain  forward  steps  which  are  now 
accepted  without  question.  The  writer  of  to-day 
who  denounces  a  plan  to  give  free  noon  lunches  to 
school  children,  or  the  proposal  to  provide  for  free 
medical  inspection  in  the  schools,  usually  uses  the 
same  arguments  which  men  employed  three  quar- 
ters of  a  century  ago  in  opposition  to  the  free  school 
system.  On  the  other  hand,  progressive  editors, 
educators  and  business  men  who  honestly  desire  to 
better  the  condition  of  the  masses  and  to  improve 
the  public-school  system,  frequently  overlook  en- 
tirely the  great  social  changes  which  have  been 
wrought  by  recent  industrial  evolution.  Much  of 
the  opposition  to  the  so-called  "fads"  in  education 
arises  because  of  a  static  or  unevolutionary  con- 
ception of  education  and  of  society.  Educational 
progress  is  often  retarded  by  its  mistaken  friends. 
300 


NEW    EDUCATIONAL    PROJECTS 

Let  us  therefore  look  at  these  educational  questions 
calmly,  and  let  us  not  be  afraid  of  abusive  terms 
used  by  reactionaries.  If  our  educational  radicalism 
is  indeed  grounded  on  the  solid  rock  of  industrial 
evolution,  to-morrow  these  marks  of  radicalism 
may  be  badges  of  honor  and  wisdom;  and  many  of 
the  men  who  now  aggressively  oppose  the  alleged 
radical  in  educational  theory  and  practice  will  accept 
the  new  ideals  and  will  point  with  pride  to  the 
results  which  have  followed  the  general  adoption  of 
these  innovations. 


301 


CHAPTER   XV 
THE    SCHOOL    OF    THE    FUTURE 

And  now  in  conclusion  we  are  confronted  by  that 
old,  yet  ever  new  question :  What  of  the  future  ? 
What  is  to  be  the  trend  of  educational  evolution 
in  the  United  States  in  the  immediate  future? 
True  we  have  problems  enough  unsolved  which 
relate  to  the  present,  but  the  future  is  unceasingly 
being  transmuted  into  the  present.  Future  prob- 
lems are  ever  becoming  present  problems.  It  is 
well  to  use  the  past  and  the  present  to  aid  us  to 
discern  in  a  general  way  the  approximate  direction 
in  which  we  are  moving.  In  fact,  present  problems 
cannot  be  properly  solved  without  looking  a  little 
way  ahead.  Society  must  have  some  sort  of  an 
aim  and  ideal  as  to  the  future  course  of  educational 
advance.  If  in  the  past  educational  aims,  methods 
and  ideals  have  been  colored  and  conditioned  by 
industrial  evolution,  similar  phenomena  may  logic- 
ally be  anticipated  in  the  future.  The  educator 
who  overlooks  or  refuses  to  consider  the  role  of 
industrial  progress  in  shaping  educational  advance 
is  living  in  a  world  of  phantoms.  History  has 
taught  him  no  lesson.  He  cannot  be  accepted  as  a 
safe  guide.  The  man  who  believes  in  perpetualism 
and  in  fixity  of  educational  values  is  outside  the 
302 


SCHOOL    OF    THE    FUTURE 

great  world  current  of  modern  thought.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  must  be  admitted  that  we  can  peer 
only  a  little  way  into  the  future,  and  can  only  per- 
ceive the  most  general  and  sweeping  portions  of  the 
educational  program  of  even  the  immediate  future. 
It  is  utterly  impossible  to  discern  details.  The  man 
who  attempts  to  minutely  describe  the  educational 
trend  of  the  next  score  of  years  is  discredited  as 
well  as  is  he  who  believes  in  static  educational 
ideals  and  values. 

The  school  of  the  future  will  be  a  natural  product 
of  social  and  industrial  progress.  Its  curriculum 
will  be  formed  and  its  methods  chosen  chiefly  as  a 
result  of  two  distinct  influences,  one  of  which,  the 
radical  influence,  arises  out  of  the  economic  and 
social  conditions  of  the  period;  and  the  other,  the 
conservative  influence,  flows  from  the  educational 
and  social  traditions  of  what  was  just  and  fitting 
in  past  years  and  generations.  However,  judging 
from  the  requirements  of  the  present,  a  few  gen- 
eralizations may  be  hazarded.  Modern  industrial 
life  and  enterprise  present  kaleidoscopic  changes. 
New  methods,  machines  and  systems  require  con- 
stantly varying  degrees  and  varieties  of  skill  from 
workers  engaged  in  a  multiplicity  of  enterprises. 
The  individual  of  the  immediate  future,  whether  he 
be  a  business  man,  a  professional  man  or  a  manual 
worker,  must  have  a  broad  educational  foundation 
so  that  he  may  be  able  to  readily  adapt  himself  to 
shifting  industrial  scenes  and  conditions.  "The 
future,"  writes  Professor  Giddings,  "belongs  to  the 
adaptable  man";  and  it  will  be  the  function  of  the 
303 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

school  of  the  future  to  produce  this  adaptable, 
resourceful,  pliable  man.  The  day  of  the  narrow, 
rigid,  lockstep  curriculum  lies  forever  behind  us. 
The  classic  educational  edifice  which  was  revered 
a  generation  or  more  ago,  built  upon  the  foundation 
of  a  purely  intellectual,  professional,  business,  or 
trade  training,  is  now  crumbling  and  cracking 
under  the  unyielding  pressure  of  modern  complex 
civilization.  The  refrigerator  car,  the  telephone, 
breakfast  foods,  the  adding  machine,  card  index 
system,  statistical  investigation,  modern  methods 
of  soil  renewal,  systematized  invention,  spell  leisure 
for  all,  and  necessitate  fluidity  of  educational 
requirements.  The  school  of  the  future  will  pro- 
vide moral,  civic,  physical  and  industrial,  as  well  as 
intellectual  training.  It  will  be  interested  in  the 
development  of  all  children  from  infancy  to  mature 
manhood.  It  will  supplement  the  work  of  the 
home,  the  factory,  the  office,  the  store  and  the  farm. 
The  school  of  the  future  will  be  a  complex  organ- 
ism, exercising  many  varied  functions.  Many  of 
the  educational  functions  which  have  been  discussed 
in  preceding  pages  will  become  integral  parts  of 
the  work  of  the  school ;  and  the  internal  mechanism 
of  the  school  will  undergo  many  changes. 

In  the  school  of  the  future  much  of  the  rigid 
routine  and  the  formality,  which  are  such  con- 
spicuous features  in  the  majority  of  the  schools  of 
to-day,  will  be  lacking.  This  is  essential  in  order 
to  compensate  for  the  routine  and  regularity  now 
connected  with  practically  all  industrial  enterprise. 
In  order  to  bring  this  to  pass,  two  improvements 
304 


SCHOOL    OF    THE    FUTURE 

are  primarily  necessary :  smaller  classes  and  better 
trained  teachers,  and  both  of  these  mean  increased 
expenditures, — a  serious  obstacle.  Fine  buildings, 
many  well-trained  teachers,  manual  training,  domes- 
tic science,  playgrounds,  vacation,  night  and  con- 
tinuation schools,  medical  inspectors,  school  dining 
rooms,  kindergartens  and  school  nurseries  cost 
money.  Larger  and  larger  shares  of  the  national 
income  must  be  applied  to  collective  uses. 

"There  must  be  a  freeing  of  the  children  in  the 
schoolroom.  No  one  who  has  not  had  to  deal  with 
pupils  who  have  passed  through  the  grades  of  the 
common  schools  has  the  slightest  idea  of  the  ruinous 
eflfect  of  the  teacher's  eternal  dictatorship  upon  the 
character  of  the  children.  Almost  everything  done 
in  the  schoolroom  is  imposed  upon  the  life  of  the 
pupil, — the  pages  he  shall  learn,  the  lessons  he  shall 
recite,  the  things  he  shall  draw,  the  copies  he  shall 
write,  the  selections  he  shall  read,  the  problems  he 
shall  solve,  the  rules  of  conduct  he  shall  observe, — 
everything  has  to  be  accepted  without  question,  and 
the  obliteration  of  personality  is  the  horrible  and 
inevitable  result."^  The  author,  when  a  high- 
school  teacher,  particularly  noticed  this  deadening 
effect  of  routine  and  superimposed  authority  upon 
his  students  in  mechanical  drawing.  The  majority 
of  students  in  those  classes  usually  wished  to  follow 
explicit  directions,  even  in  regard  to  minute  and 
non-essential  details.  They  did  not  wish,  as  a  rule, 
to  make  a  personal  choice  as  to  titles,  position  of 

*W.  S.  Jackman.  Quoted  in  Zueblin,  American  Municipal 
Progress,  p.  156. 

20  305 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

views,  of  objects  to  be  drawn,  or  of  style  of  letter- 
ing, but  seemed  rather  to  prefer  to  accept,  without 
question,  the  teacher's  dictum  or  preference.  It 
seemed  very  difficult  for  many  to  utilize  oppor- 
tunities to  exercise  their  own  judgment  and 
initiative.  Manual  training,  when  properly  taught, 
aids  greatly  in  increasing  the  student's  resourceful- 
ness and  ability  to  depend  upon  himself;  and  a 
partial  explanation  of  this  fact  lies  in  the  disuse 
of  the  rigid  class  system.  Each  student  in  manual 
training  may  be  allowed  to  progress  according  to 
his  own  ability  and  energy. 

The  school  of  the  future  ought  to  impress  its 
lessons  by  example  and  influence  rather  than  by 
dissertations.  The  effect  of  good  environment  and 
good  example,  rather  than  excellent  mottoes  and 
rules  of  conduct,  should  be  called  upon.  An  editor 
has  put  the  matter  in  a  nutshell :  "Boys  are  won 
not  by  preaching,  but  by  precept."  The  school 
building  itself  should  be  a  practical  example  of 
simplicity,  good  sanitation,  comfort  and  beauty.  It 
must  be  clean,  well-lighted,  and  of  good  architec- 
ture. Pictures  should  hang  on  the  walls;  plants 
and  flowers  should  adorn  the  rooms  and  the  yard. 
Let  the  children  feel  that  these  things  belong  to 
them,  and  that  they  must  take  good  care  of  the 
building  and  its  furnishings.  These  material 
things  are  silent,  but  powerful,  monitors  which 
influence  each  child  for  good.  Supplement  the 
influence  of  the  building  by  that  of  the  calm, 
sympathetic,  neat,  well-trained  teacher,  and  a  long 
stride  forward  is  taken  in  the  direction  of  better 
306 


SCHOOL    OF    THE    FUTURE 

education.  The  school  ought  to  give  the  child  a 
picture  of  what  right  living  is  and  means.  Surely, 
this  ought  to  be  the  heritage  of  every  child,  rich  or 
poor.  The  schoolhouse  in  the  poorer  sections  of  a 
city  particularly  needs  to  be  given  special  care.  In 
too  many  cases,  unfortunately,  the  school  is  similar 
in  many  respects  to  the  dingy,  cheerless  home  of 
the  child.  After  describing  the  ugly,  dirty,  depress- 
ing and  repulsive  environment  of  the  anthracite 
coal  regions.  Dr.  Roberts  observes,  and  what  he 
says  may  be  almost  literally  applied  to  the  condi- 
tions in  many  of  our  cities :  "That  is  the  environ- 
ment of  thousands  of  the  youths  in  the  anthracite 
regions  and  it  inflicts  upon  the  man  incalculable 
wrong  which  influences  his  whole  life.  Amid  so 
much  that  is  ugly  and  debasing,  ought  not  the 
plastic  minds  of  these  children  be  brought  in  con- 
tact with  one  spot  that  is  beautiful  and -setene, 
which  would  exert  a  holy  influence  upon  their  souls 
and  stimulate  their  aesthetic  sense?  When  the 
environment  of  the  public  school  and  the  interior 
of  the  schoolroom  conform  to  artistic  taste  in  the 
highest  sense,  then  a  sacred  influence  will  work 
upon  the  awakening  mind  of  the  child  which  will 
add  dignity  and  interest  to  the  specific  work  of  the 
teacher.  Its  grace  and  suggestiveness  will  also 
do  something  to  repair  the  wrong  done  the  child 
by  the  neglect  and  cupidity  of  those  responsible  for 
the  depressing  environment  generally  found  in  the 
mining  communities."  The  agitation  for  school 
betterment  must  be  aided  and  supported  by  those 
most  directly  concerned — the  laboring  people.  They 
307 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

feel  these  conditions  directly  and  personally;  they 
must  keep  up  the  struggle. 

The  school  of  the  future  must  adapt  itself  to  the 
nature  of  the  child ;  the  pupil  should  enjoy  attend- 
ing school.  The  methods  of  the  kindergarten,  the 
vacation  school  and  parental  school  will,  therefore, 
find  a  place  in  the  grade  schools.  No  school  can 
be  termed  successful  and  efficient  while  a  con- 
siderable percentage  of  the  pupils  dislike  it  and  its 
lessons.  Something  is  wrong  where  this  is  the  case. 
Education  of  the  proper  kind  is  pleasurable,  and 
will  bring  forth  the  best  efforts  of  the  pupil.  If 
the  school  is  a  place  to  be  avoided,  the  average 
student  will  not  continue  his  education  after  he  is 
released  from  school.  Such  a  school  is  doubly 
inefficient.  Elbert  Hubbard  writes :  "In  the  future 
our  children  shall  go  to  school — not  be  sent  or  sen- 
tenced"; and  in  many  schools  this  desirable  con- 
dition has  already  been  attained.  The  school  of 
the  future  will  become  the  playground,  gymnasium, 
workshop  and  reading  and  study  room  of  the  boys 
and  girls,  and  of  the  older  people  as  well.  The 
daily  sessions  will  be  longer,  the  gap  now  made  by 
our  long  vacation  will  be  filled  up,  and  the  school- 
house  will  be  open  evenings.  The  character  of  the 
work  given  will  vary  with  the  seasons  and  will  be 
somewhat  dissimilar  in  different  localities  and 
environments.  To  be  successful  in  a  city  the  recre- 
ation feature  must  be  made  more  attractive  than 
those  offered  by  the  street,  with  which  the  school  is 
to  come  into  active  competition.  The  schools  of  a 
rjreat  city  will,  in  the  future,  afford  a  good,  health- 
308 


SCHOOL    OF    THE    FUTURE 

ful,  inspiring  environment  for  children  and  young 
people.  They  will  offer  places  of  refuge  for  many 
who  otherwise  must  pass  much  of  their  time  in 
undesirable  environments. 

A  serious  menace  to  our  school  system  is  the 
so-called  "commercialization"  of  the  schools.  The 
systematization  of  large  businesses,  with  the  accom- 
panying economy  of  operation,  has  led  the  com- 
mercial interests  of  the  country  to  desire  to  apply 
"business  principles"  to  education.  The  motive 
force  is,  of  course,  reduction  of  taxation.  The  aims 
and  methods  employed  must  be  diametrically 
opposed  to  those  which  have  been  discussed  as 
appropriate  for  the  school  of  the  future.  The 
animus  of  the  recent  "shake-up"  of  the  Chicago 
Board  of  Education  is  to  be  found  in  a  desire  for 
reduction  of  expense,  and  for  simplification  and 
standardization  of  educational  work.  The  com- 
mercialization of  the  schools  means  inefficiency. 
"Children  are  not  pots  and  pans  to  be  shaped  by 
patterns  sent  down  from  a  central  office.  Teachers 
are  not  drudges  to  be  ordered  about  by  a  master 
mechanic."  Education  is  an  artistic  form  of  indus- 
try; its  normal  products  are  highly  individualized. 
Standardization  of  its  products  leads  to  imperfect 
output.  The  teacher  is  a  skilled  workman  or,  more 
accurately,  an  artist.  Methods  must  vary  with 
teachers;  crowded  schoolrooms,  systematic  and 
numerous  reports  bound  up  in  red  tape,  clock-like 
precision  and  central-office  management  convert 
the  school  into  a  factory.  Commercialization  of 
the  schools  hampers  and  drives  out  the  efficient 
309 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

teacher  and  spoils  the  child.  Commercialization 
means  reduced  wages  for  the  teacher,  smaller 
equipments,  less  school  buildings,  fewer  educational 
"fads"  or  improvements ;  in  short,  reduced  expense 
per  pupil.  The  antithesis  is  fiijance  versus  educa- 
tion ;  the  taxpayer  versus  the  child ;  special  interests 
versus  society.  The  demand  for  commercialization 
of  the  school  is  a  phase  of  the  old,  old  struggle  of 
the  taxpayer  against  the  development  of  an  efficient, 
up-to-date  free  school  system. 

Betterment  of  the  conditions  in  any  industry 
comes  from  within.  The  struggle  against  com- 
mercialization must  be  started  and  maintained  in  no 
small  degree  by  the  teachers.  Better  and  broader 
trained  teachers  are  needed.  Teaching  must  be 
looked  upon  as  a  profession  before  it  can  attain  its 
true  position  among  the  occupations  of  men  and 
women.  Unionization  of  the  wage-earners  in  other 
industries  has  prevented  the  brutalization  of  the 
worker  under  the  stress  of  commercialization,  or  in 
other  words  under  the  pressure  of  an  insistent 
demand  for  profits.  Local,  state  and  national 
organization  of  the  school  teachers  in  accordance 
with  trade-union  policies  seems  to  be  a  necessary 
measure  to  prevent  the  degradation  of  the  teaching 
profession  through  low  wages  and  overwork,  and 
to  stop  the  tendency  to  transfer  public-school  edu- 
cation from  the  category  of  artistic  industry  to  that 
of  a  factory  industry.  Through  organization  the 
salary  and  the  standard  of  the  teaching  profession 
could  be  raised,  and  the  tenure  of  office  made  more 
secure.  The  organized  strength  of  the  members 
310 


SCHOOL    OF    THE    FUTURE 

of  this  profession  is  needed  to  lift  the  school  system 
out  of  the  reach  of  petty  politicians.  Strikes,  of 
course,  are  out  of  the  question;  but  public  officials 
and  boards  of  education  are  nominally  servants  of 
the  people,  and  can  be  reached  and  influenced  by 
united,  perservering  efforts.  The  experience  of 
Chicago  and  Toledo  teachers  is  indicative  of  what 
can  be  accomplished.  In  the  latter  city  a  weak 
organization,  supported  by  only  a  small  percentage 
of  the  teachers  of  that  city,  was  able  to  exercise 
considerable  influence.  The  notable  achievements 
of  the  organized  teachers  of  the  city  of  Chicago  is  a 
matter  of  common  knowledge.  "In  organization 
there  is  strength." 

With  the  entrance  of  new  aims  and  methods 
into  the  school  the  training  of  teachers  for  their 
work  should,  naturally,  undergo  modification.  The 
teacher  should  firmly  grasp  the  idea  that  there  is 
no  absolute  or  world-wide  concept  of  educational 
ideals  and  methods.  As  has  been  suggested,  these 
change  with  social  and  industrial  progress,  and 
should  conform  to  local  and  national  peculiarities 
and  needs.  The  education  which  was  best  during 
the  Middle  Ages,  or  in  the  early  part  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  is  not  the  most  desirable  to-day 
and  for  the  United  States.  Likewise  the  education 
of  the  city  boy  should  be  somewhat  different  from 
that  of  the  country  child.  The  school  must  aim  to 
strengthen  and  supplement  the  home  and  environ- 
mental influences.  "The  city  fathers  do  not  appre- 
ciate the  social  needs,  and  the  teachers,  as  a  class, 
are  lacking  in  a  knowledge  of  industrial  history  and 
3" 


SCHOOL    OF    THE    FUTURE 

social  evolution.  They  have  not  realized  that  the 
home  is  passing  away,  and  that  unless  the  school 
takes  the  child  he  is  left  to  the  street.  They  have 
specialized  in  philosophy,  pedagogy,  and  psy- 
chology. They  have  isolated  themselves  from  con- 
tact with  those  in  poverty."^  The  psychology  of 
the  child  and  his  physical  well-being  should  receive 
attention  from  experts ;  but  the  teacher  of  the  future 
needs  especially  to  study  sociology  and  to  come 
into  contact  with  old  and  young  of  all  conditions 
of  life.  Sympathetic  knowledge  of  the  child's  ideals 
is  more  desirable  than  further  analysis  by  teachers 
of  the  psychology  of  the  child.  Our  normal  schools 
devote  too  much  time  and  energy  to  psychology 
and  the  gentle  art  of  adroit  questioning,  and  not 
enough  to  social  and  industrial  evolution.  Modern 
American  education,  as  has  been  seen,  is  becoming 
a  potent  factor  in  the  social  and  industrial  progress 
and  development  of  the  United  States.  If  our 
teachers  are  not  trained  so  as  to  recognize  this 
function  of  education,  and  to  aid  in  increasing  its 
importance,  our  school  system  cannot  perform  its 
full  duty  to  the  community. 

The  problem  of  raising  the  funds  to  maintain 
the  school  of  the  future  is  a  serious  one,  although 
in  a  time  of  peace  the  nation  is  spending  more 
for  war  than  for  education.  Better  trained  teach- 
ers, longer  school  days  and  school  years,  smaller 
classes,  the  introduction  of  the  laboratory  and 
manual  training,  kindergartens,  better  buildings, 
night  schools,  gymnasiums,  playgrounds  and  other 

*  Hunter,  Poverty,  p.  209. 

312 


SCHOOL    OF    THE    FUTURE 

modern  school  necessities,  mean  the  doubling  and 
trebling  of  the  expense  of  the  public-school  system 
of  the  United  States.  We  must  turn  to  the  econo-r 
mist  and  student  of  taxation  for  sources  which  are 
available  to  increase  the  revenues  without  injurious 
effects  upon  our  industrial  growth  and  prosperity. 
Such  sources  are  found  in  the  enormous  differential, 
monopoly  and  "forced"  gains  which  now  accrue  to 
many  specially  favored  members  of  our  irftlustrial 
world.  The  justice  in  cutting  off  unusual  earnings, 
and  monopolistic  and  speculative  gains,  in  order  to 
divert  them  from  the  pockets  of  individuals  into  the 
public  treasury,  is  now  quite  generally  recognized. 
Increased  inheritance  taxes,  income  taxes,  increased 
taxation  of  city  land  values  and  franchise  taxation 
are  some  of  the  forms  of  taxation  which  might  be 
utilized  by  our  state  and  local  authorities  to  increase 
the  revenues  which  could  be  applied  to  the  improve- 
ment and  extension  of  the  work  of  the  public- 
school  system.  This  is  certainly  a  fair  and  just 
way  of  applying  unusual  or  unearned  incomes  of 
individuals  to  uses  which  make  for  the  common 
good  and  for  the  progress  of  the  nation. 

On  the  other  hand,  improvements  in  the  social 
and  economic  features  of  our  educational  system 
will  tend  to  decrease  certain  expenditures  and  to 
increase  the  productive  capacity  of  the  people.  If 
the  public  school  provides  industrial  and  physical 
training,  and  opportunity  foi;  healthful  and  invig- 
orating recreation  for  all,  the  result  will  be  to 
gradually  reduce  criminality,  to  improve  the  bodily 
health  and  vigor  of  the  people,  and  to  increase  the 
313 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

industrial  efficiency  of  the  great  mass  of  workers. 
Ample  compensation  for  increased  expenditure  for 
•educational  purposes  will  be  finally  obtained  through 
decrease  in  crime,  in  cost  of  jails  and  police, 
through  increase  in  the  total  productiveness  of  the 
nation,  and  on  account  of  longer  average  length  of 
life  and  lessened  amount  of  ill-health.  One  student 
of  the  question  estimates  that  about  $200,000,000  of 
our  local,  state  and  federal  expenditures  are  charge- 
able to  crime,  and  that  the  total  annual  income  of 
all  the  habitual  criminals  is  about  $400,000,000. 
To  this  total  of  $600,000,000,  he  continues,  must 
be  added  the  cost  of  lives  taken,  labor  lost,  property 
maliciously  destroyed,  the  cost  of  locks,  bolts  and 
safe-deposit  vaults,  and  the  mental  suffering,  broken 
homes,  desolation  and  despair.  If  the  introduction 
of  a  thorough  system  of  manual  training,  kinder- 
gartens, vacation  schools,  playgrounds,  parental 
schools,  etc.,  would  in  a  relatively  short  time  reduce 
the  above  estimate  by  one  fourth  or  by  $150,000,000 
annually,  it  would  release  a  sum  greater  than  was 
spent  for  the  entire  school  system  of  this  country 
in  1890.  And  if  we  may  judge  by  the  value  of  the. 
playgrounds  and  vacation  schools  already  estab- 
lished, a  considerable  reduction  of  juvenile  crime 
would  follow  the  general  introduction  of  these 
innovations.  A  decrease  in  juvenile  crime  to-day 
means  a  corresponding  reduction  of  adult  crime 
to-morrow.  No  less  important  are  the  possible 
savings  in  longer  life,  better  health  and  increased 
efficiency  which  the  American  people  may  reason- 
ably anticipate  from  an  improved  school  system 
314 


SCHOOL    OF    THE    FUTURE 

which  is  able  to  perform  the  social  and  industrial 
functions  which,  as  progress  has  decreed,  should 
now  become  integral  parts  of  the  work  of  education. 
Recently  many  voices  have  been  heard  and  many, 
many  books  and  magazine  articles  have  been  written 
in  regard  to  the  question  of  "race  suicide."  This 
phenomenon  must  be  considered  by  the  economist, 
the  sociologist  and  the  educator.  Truly,  if  the 
wealthier  and  "cultured"  people  of  the  nation  have 
smaller  families  than  the  mass  of  the  workers,  if 
they  delay  or  abstain  from  marriage,  a  larger  per- 
centage of  the  next  generation  must  come  from  the 
ranks  of  the  laboring  population,  the  so-called 
masses,  than  probably  came  from  that  class  in  the 
present  generation.  Many  deplore  in  emphatic 
terms  this  apparent  "dying  at  the  top,"  and  see  in 
it  sure  signs  of  a  decline  in  the  ability  and  vigor 
of  the  American  people.  Our  view  of  this  matter 
is,  in  a  large  measure,  dependent  upon  our  theory 
of  heredity.  Does  or  does  not  the  child  inherit  the 
intellectual,  industrial,  or  professional  traits  of  his 
father  or  grandfather?  If  he  does,  if  a  son  of  a 
college  professor  is,  through  heredity,  irrespective 
of  environment,  best  prepared  for  the  teaching  pro- 
fession, if  the  son  of  a  machinist  is  born  with  those 
traits  which  make  him  specially  adapted  to  follow 
his  father's  trade,  then  indeed  we  must  look  with 
alarm  upon  any  tendency  toward  "race  suicide" 
amongst  certain  classes  of  our  population.  But  if 
we  accept,  as  probably  we  must  sooner  or  later,  the 
theory  that  the  child  comes  into  the  world  with 
practically  no  intellectual  or  industrial  inheritance 
31S 


INDUSTRIAL    EVOLUTION 

from  his  immediate  ancestors,  then  may  we  view 
this  phenomenon  with  more  complacency.  Our 
attention  and  energy  will  be  turned  toward  better- 
ing the  home  and  school  environment,  and  toward 
improving  the  influences  which  act  upon  the  grow- 
ing child.  Let  us  cease  writing  and  declaiming 
about  "race  suicide,"  and  utilize  our  energy  in  an 
effort  to  improve  the  social,  industrial  and  educa- 
tional conditions  of  the  masses.  Here  is  a  work 
worthy  of  the  best  efforts  of  the  earnest  reformer 
and  the  true  statesman.  If  the  prominent  men  and 
women  who  are  employing  so  much  time  and 
energy  in  a  vain  flood  of  written  and  spoken  words 
will  turn  their  faces  toward  the  great  problem  of 
a  modern  democracy — the  education  of  the  masses — ■ 
an  important  and  valuable  work  might  be  accom- 
plished which  would  redound  to  their  honor.  It 
seems  quite  clear  that  luxury  and  "culture"  lead 
almost  invariably  in  a  few  generations  to  degen- 
eracy. The  history  of  this  republic  offers  hundreds 
of  conspicuous  examples  of  this  phenomenon.  His- 
tory teaches  that  the  hope  of  a  nation  lies  in  the 
masses.  If  they  are  weaklings  and  degenerates, 
decay  inevitably  follows.  Education  in  a  democ- 
racy of  the  modern  industrial  type  should  lead  to 
industry,  to  the  "simple"  and  self-supporting  life, 
to  ideals  which  emphasize  doing  rather  than  being 
served,  to  the  apotheosis  of  work  rather  than  of 
leisure,  to  higher  aims  than  that  of  mere  wealth 
accumulation.^ 

*  See  "Broad  Aspects  of  Race  Suicide,"  by  the  author,  in 
The  Arena,  December,  1906. 

316 


INDEX 


Adams,  Prof.  H,  B.,  274. 

Agricultural  college,  the,  206. 

Agricultural  education  classi- 
fied, 207. 

Agriculture  in  the  public 
schools,  212;  the  United 
States  Department  of,  219. 

Apprenticeship,  198;  present 
status  of,  200 ;  statistics 
of,  200 ;  agreements  in  re- 
gard to,  202 ;  legal  require- 
ments in  regard  to,  203. 

Art  in  industry,   140. 

Athletics,  educational  value 
of,  246. 

Baths,  municipal,  262, 

Calvinism,  24. 

Carter,  J.  G.,  29. 

Chicago,  university-extension 
work  of,  274. 

Child  labor,  a  preventive  of, 
296. 

Children,  the  motives  of,  244, 

Cities  favor  educational  prog- 
ress, the,  34 ;  rapid  growth 
of,  58. 

Citizenship,   training  in,   268. 

City,  the  modern,  59 ;  the 
school,  266. 

Civil  War,  educational  ad- 
vance after  the,  40. 

Class  demarkations,  10,  87, 
i6r. 

Coercion  is  inefficient  as  a 
remedy  for  social  ills,  297. 

Colonial  education,  23. 


Commercial    education,    222 ; 

recent  progress  in,  223. 
Commercialization      of      the 

schools,   309. 
Commons,  Prof.  J.  R.,  194. 
Conference    on     Home    Eco- 
nomics, Lake   Placid,    175. 
Conscience,   the   rennaissance 

of  the  physical,  263. 
Continuation  school,  the,  226  ; 

for     boys,     curriculum     in, 

236. 
Correspondence  instruction  in 

America,       185 ;      methods 

employed  in,  189. 
Correspondence    School,    the 

International,  190. 
Crime,  cost  of,  314. 
Curriculum   of   the  school  of 

the  future,  303. 

Debt,  imprisonment  for,  30. 

Dewey,  Melvil,  275. 

Dining  room,  objections  to, 
school,  289 ;  arguments  in 
favor  of,  290. 

Division  of  labor,  65,  66,  70. 

Domestic  science,  174  i  edu- 
cational value  of,  121  ; 
economic  value  of,  178. 

Economic  Association,  Amer- 
ican, 6. 

Education,  functions  of,  9 ; 
should  be  democratic,  1 1  ; 
a  fundamental  measure  in 
the  betterment  of  the 
masses,  16;  can  it  be  made 


317 


INDEX 


a  directive  social  agent? 
17;  increased  importance 
of,  54 ;  should  be  modified 
to  fit  individual  needs,  79 ; 
should  be  made  pleasur- 
able, 308 ;  in  a  democracy, 
316. 

Educational  innovations,  op- 
position to,  255. 

Educational  evolution  in  the 
near  future,  302. 

Educational  unrest,  13. 

Employment  agency,  school 
as  an,  291. 

Environment,  educational 
value  of  good,  306. 

Fads,   educational,   42. 
Farmers'  institutes,   the,   218. 
Feeding  school  children,  289. 
Fellenberg's   school,  266. 
Financial  problems,  312. 
Forestry,   schools  of,   221  ;  is 

a  form  of  agriculture,  221. 
Frontier,    the    effect    of    the 

disappearance  of  the,  55. 
Future,  the  school  of  the,  302. 

Gardens,  school,   260. 

Germans  in  Pennsylvania  op- 
pose free  schools,  38. 

Gill,  W.  L.,  266. 

Grammar  schools,   26. 

Great-man  theory  of  educa- 
tional progress,  45. 

Green,  T.  H.,  34. 

Hampton  Institute,  196. 

Hand  work,  revival  of,   144. 

Harper,  Dr.   W.  R.,   186. 

Higgins,  M.   P.,  185. 

Hobson,  J.  A.,  70. 

Home,  the  modern,  98 ;  rea- 
sons for  diminishing  edu- 
cational value   of,   118. 

Home  training  contrasted 
with  school  training,  51, 
96,  109. 


Household  industry  is  doomed, 

IDS. 

Housekeeping  schools,   235. 
Hull    House    Labor    Museum, 

146. 
Hunter,  Robert,  289. 
Hysperia   movement,    219, 

Ideals  demanded,  new  educa- 
tional, 88. 

Immigration,   56,   64. 

Imperialism,  danger  from,  72. 

Industrial  school,  day,  247. 

Industry,  influence  of  primi- 
tive and  of  modern,  48. 

James,  Pres.  E.  J.,  3. 

Juvenile  delinquent,  compos- 
ite picture  of  a,  240 ;  in 
Cook  County  jail,  252. 

Kindergarten  movement  in 
America,  170. 

Labor,  prejudice  against,  84 ; 

place  in  history,  150. 
Laboratory  work,  educational 

value  of,   127. 
Lamed,  Mrs.  L.  H.,   177. 
Leisure,  educational  value  of, 

234- 
Library,  growth  of  the  travel- 
ing, 276. 

Mallock,  W.  H.,  81. 
Mann,  Horace,  28. 
Manual-training  movement  in 

America,   i7i. 
Maternal    schools     in     Paris, 

287. 
Medical     inspectors     in     the 

schools,  work  of,  282 ;  are 

needed,  285. 
Mitchell,  John,  62. 


Negro  industrial  schools,  192. 
New  York,   education   in,  35. 


318 


INDEX 


New    Zealand,   transportation 

of  school  children  in,  279, 

281. 
Newsboys'  organizations,  257. 
Nineteenth    century,    progress 

during,  4. 
Normal  schools,  the  work  of, 

312. 
Nursery,   the  school,  286. 

Oberlin  College,  184. 

Ohio,  transportation  of  school 

children  in,  278. 
Oneida  Institute,   184. 
Organizations,  teachers',  310. 

Parental  school,  the,  114;  the 
Chicago,  248,  251. 

Paternalism  in  the  United 
States,  295. 

Paying  children  to  go  to 
school,  294. 

Pennsylvania,  education  in, 
36. 

Philanthropy,  opportunity  for 
private,  227. 

Playgrounds,  261. 

Population,  growth  of,  30, 
239- 

Poverty,  the  evils  of,  253. 

Precedent,  value  of,  151. 

Public-school  instruction,  dif- 
ficulties  and   evils   in,  241. 

Public  schools,  attendance  in 
the,  226 ;  do  not  reach  the 
workers,  227 ;  utilitarian 
education  in  the,  229. 

Race  degeneracy,   104. 
Race  suicide,  315. 
Radicalism,      opposition      to, 

299,   301. 
Referendum  vote  in  1850,  60. 
Reformatories,  250. 
Robinson,  C.  M.,  148. 
Roycroft  Shop,  145. 


Saloon,  substitutes  for  the, 
258. 

Savings   banks,   school,    271. 

School  work,  dislike  for,  82. 

Schools,  arguments  in  favor 
of  free   tax-supported,   31. 

Self-supporting    schools,    184. 

Simpson,  Stephen,  33. 

Social  center,  the  school  as  a, 
255- 

Specialization,  the  effect  up- 
on the  worker  of,  142;  of 
industry,   62,   67,  69. 

Spencer's  educational  theo- 
ries,  124. 

Street  gangs,  257. 

Suburban  schools,  transpor- 
tation  of   pupils  to,   280. 

Sunday,    instruction    on,    231. 

Systematization  in  the  public 
schools,  dangers  of,  74. 

Teachers     are     conservative, 

130. 
Technical     instruction     in 

America,  204. 
Textile  schools,  182. 
Toledo      University      School, 

147,  268. 
Trade,     manual-training     and 

technical    schools    differen- 
tiated, 130. 
Trade    school,   the,    180 ;    the 

New  York,  181. 
Transportation  of  pupils,  277, 

280. 
Truant  school,  the,  247. 
Trusts,  effects  of  the,  63. 
Tuskegee    Institute,    196. 

Union  meetings  in  public- 
school  buildings,  labor,  260. 

Unionism,  ethics  of,  152; 
stands  for  high  ideals,  156; 
demands  of,  158;  program 
of,   162. 


319 


INDEX 


Unions  do  not  actively  op- 
pose manual  training,  labor, 
137,  164. 

University  extension,  273. 

Vacation  schools,  growth  of, 

264. 
Variation   in  individuals,   "jt, 

116. 
Veblen,  T.  B.,  61. 

Ward,  L.  F.,  46. 
Washington,  B.  T.,  193. 
Wayland,  Dr.  Francis,  113. 


Wilmerding  School  of  Indus- 
trial Arts,  181. 

Wisconsin,  University  of, 
188,  207. 

Woman,  as  the  primitive 
worker,  97;  work  of,  100, 
102 ;  workers  in  the  United 
States,  43,  loi  ;  problem, 
the  crux  of  the,  107. 

Work,  educational  value  of, 
90,  93;  the  right  to,  291. 

Working  Man's  Advocate, 
156. 

Workingmen's  party  in  New 
York,  33. 


320 


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—New  York  Tribune. 

Standards  of  Public  Morality 

By  Arthur  TwiKiNG  Hadley,  Ph.D.,  LL.D.,  Presi- 
dent of  Yale  University. 

Cloth,  IZnw,  $1.00  net;  by  mail,  $1.06 

"Perhaps  the  most  satisfactory  explanation  of  the  incongruous 
difference  between  American  standards  of  public  and  private 
morality  yet  given  in  popular  form  is  set  forth  in  the  first  essay." 

—New  York  Tribune. 

"The  volume  is  all  the  better  for  its  exactly  aimed  point  and  con- 
ciseness." -Chicago  Tribune. 


Published  by 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

64-66  Fifth  Avenue,  NEW  YORK 


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DATE  DUE 


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